Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[MR. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — EDUCATION

Teaching English Abroad (Report)

Sir B. Janner: asked the Minister of Education whether his attention has been called to the Report of the British Council which comments on the problem of teaching English abroad and the need for training teachers for this purpose; and what action he proposes to take on the Council's recommendations in this respect.

The Minister of Education (Sir David Eccles): Yes Sir, I have read the report with great appreciation. The main recommendation is for the establishment of a career service in teaching English abroad. The Second Commonwealth Education Conference, which was held at Delhi in January, welcomed a British proposal for the creation of such a service and the practical details are being worked out.

Sir B. Janner: Will the Minister say whether he is making arrangements for the training of teachers in view of the difficulty in this country, or perhaps in one of the Commonwealth countries, of filling the gaps for teachers in the various countries?

Sir D. Eccles: The object of this service is to train experts who in their turn will train those who are to teach English in the Commonwealth.

School Buildings

Sir B. Janner: asked the Minister of Education what representations he has received from health or other authorities about the effect of excessive glass in school buildings on the health and

eyesight of children; and what action he proposes to take in this matter.

Sir D. Eccles: I would refer the hon. Member to the Eighth Report of the Estimates Committee for the Session 1960–61 and to my observations on it, which describe the action I propose.

Commonwealth Education Conference

Mr. G. M. Thomson: asked the Minister of Education what steps he is taking to implement the recommendations of the Commonwealth Education Conference at New Delhi.

Dr. A. Thompson: asked the Minister of Education what action he is taking upon the recommendations of the Commonwealth Education Conference at New Delhi.

Sir D. Eccles: The recommendations on which this country can take action are being actively considered. Steps are also being taken to implement the offers for new developments made by the British delegation.

Mr. Thomson: Will the Minister take steps to ensure that the Report of the New Delhi Conference is made available to Members of Parliament through the Vote Office? Is he aware that there is only one copy in the House of Commons—in the Library—available for all hon. Members who are interested? On the general question of the Conference, would he not agree that the results are rather disappointing in relation to the kind of hopes we had had of this organisation? Will Her Majesty's Government do everything they can to make sure that they play their part in making the kind of resources available which will enable this very important scheme of Commonwealth mutual aid to make satisfactory progress?

Sir D. Eccles: On the first point, I have made arrangements that the Report shall be published and made available to hon. Members. On the second point, I agree that this is a most interesting and valuable development. The British delegation took the lead in proposing an extension, but not all Commonwealth countries seem prepared to put up the resources we would like.

Dr. Thompson: Will the Minister give an assurance that the proposals made at the New Delhi Conference for the admission of technicians and craftsmen to this country to work for six months in British industry will not be affected by any of the provisions of the Commonwealth Immigrants Bill?

Sir D. Eccles: Yes, I can give that assurance.

Teachers

Mr. Holland: asked the Minister of Education what proposals he has for checking the drift of male teachers from primary to secondary schools.

Sir D. Eccles: Teachers of both sexes have been moving from the primary schools where school rolls have been declining to the secondary schools where they have been rising. Local education authorities are aware that the pressure of numbers in the primary schools is about to be renewed and will know how best to deploy the teachers in their service.

Mr. Holland: Is my right hon. Friend aware that I have recently met schoolmasters with a real vocation for primary teaching who are compelled by economic reasons to transfer to secondary schools in order to obtain posts of responsibility? Could he not suggest to the Burnham Committee that now is the time when the Committee might look again at the scale of units on which those posts are graded and paid?

Sir D. Eccles: The facts are that the proportion of men receiving payments above scale for responsibility is greater in the primary schools than in the secondary schools, but I agree with my hon. Friend that we need more men in the primary schools.

Dr. King: Is the Minister aware that, apart from any disparity in the opportunities for posts of special responsibility, there is still in the Burnham scale financial inequality as between primary and secondary schools? If he believes—as we believe he does—in the importance of primary education, does he not think it time that we had a nearer approach to parity between the two branches?

Sir D. Eccles: It is not always popular when I say what I would like the Burnham Committee to do.

Backward Readers

Mr. Holland: asked the Minister of Education how many primary schools provide a remedial class for backward readers; and whether provision for such a class is made in deciding the quota of teaching staff of each primary school.

Sir D. Eccles: The arrangements for giving special help to backward readers vary from one place to another. Precise statistical information is not available. I do not fix quotas for individual schools but the formula used in calculating quotas for each local education authority makes an allowance for special classes in ordinary schools.

Mr. Holland: Is my right hon. Friend aware that at a primary school in my constituency, which happens to be fortunate enough to have a remedial class for backward readers, I have seen children brought forward from a nil reading ability last September up to the average ability of 9-year-olds and 10-year-olds in January? Could he not, on this his namesake's day in the Church calendar, decide to take more active steps to increase the more universal provision of these facilities?

Sir D. Eccles: I agree with my hon. Friend that these special classes produce remarkable results, and I should like to see them increased

Mrs. White: Would not the right hon. Gentleman agree that this work can be particularly well done by married women, teaching possibly part-time who are ex-quota?

Sir D. Eccles: I think that suggestion is well worth pursuing.

Colleges of Advanced Technology (Admissions)

Mr. Albu: asked the Minister of Education what discussions he has had with the committee of vice-chancellors of the universities about the inclusion of the colleges of advanced technology in the proposed clearing house for university admissions.

Sir D. Eccles: In the first instance, this is a matter for the Committee of Principals of Colleges of Advanced Technology.

Mr. Albu: Would not the Minister agree that the handicap here is not the principals of colleges of advanced technology but the vice-chancellors of the universities, and that it is highly desirable that the colleges of advanced technology should be included in any clearing house scheme for the various departments of the universities?

Sir D. Eccles: I understand that conversations are about to begin between the principals of the colleges of advanced technology and the Central Council for University Admissions, and I hope very much that they will be successful.

Oversea Migration Board (Report)

Mr. Fisher: asked the Minister of Education whether he will act upon the recommendation in the Seventh Report of the Oversea Migration Board concerning higher education for the skilled and professional manpower which is now needed in the Commonwealth.

Sir D. Eccles: I have seen this Report, and I agree that the needs of the developing countries for skilled and professional manpower are very great. These requirements are taken into account in our educational planning. Educational institutions in this country train a large number of people from overseas and make a major contribution to meet the needs of the Commonwealth.

Mr. Fisher: As my right hon. Friend acknowledges the real increasing need, especially in the less developed countries of the Commonwealth, for this sort of manpower, will he, especially in conjunction with my right hon. Friend the Minister for Technical Co-operation, launch a wide-ranging and imaginative drive to ensure that the supply matches up with this demand?

Sir D. Eccles: Both my right hon Friend and I are very well aware of the need, but we have already 55,000 full-time students from overseas in the United Kingdom, 12,000 in universities, 13,000 in technical colleges and 1,400 in

teacher-training institutions. This is more than any other country does, but I am not content with it.

Handicapped School Leavers

Mr. Scott-Hopkins: asked the Minister of Education whether he has received the report from the British Council of Rehabilitation on the needs of handicapped school leavers; and if he will make a statement.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Education (Mr. Kenneth Thompson): My right hon. Friend hopes to receive this report by the end of the year.

Mr. Scott-Hopkins: Will my hon. Friend take steps to have the report published? Will he also bear in mind how important it is that this section of our school children should receive the maximum support they can get, because at the moment they are not getting quite as good a deal as the rest of the school leavers?

Mr. Thompson: I agree with the latter remarks of my hon. Friend, and I will consider his proposal about publication of the report.

School Buses (Discipline)

Mr. J. P. W. Mallalieu: asked the Minister of Education what steps he has taken, in co-operation with transport contractors and school authorities, to ensure orderly behaviour on school buses.

Sir D. Eccles: This is a matter for local education authorities, which are responsible for arranging school transport.

Mr. Mallalieu: Does not the Minister remember that he said in the House a month or so ago that he was having consultations with the local authorities about this and was proposing some sort of new scheme? Who is responsible for the maintenance of discipline on these buses after school hours? Is it the school or the contractor?

Sir D. Eccles: It is for the local authorities to make arrangements with the transport contractors which are satisfactory. In the case which the hon.


Gentleman knows, there was an unfortunate incident, and I hope that it will not occur again.

Mr. Awbery: Is it not possible to establish bus wardens, on similar lines to the traffic wardens, to do this work?

Sir D. Eccles: I will consider that.

Peases West Schools, Crook

Mr. Ainsley: asked the Minister of Education if he is aware of the uneconomic burden placed upon the county education committee by the continued use of two buildings for junior mixed and infant departments in the Peases West schools, Crook, Co. Durham; and what proposal he has approved to improve such conditions in the near future.

Sir D. Eccles: I understand that the local education authority is working out a scheme to bring all the children at the Peases West primary school into one building, but it has not yet been put to me for approval.

Mr. Ainsley: Is the Minister aware that I started my educational career in one of the buildings that is still in use, with high and narrow windows, often with shadows across the desks, and very often with artificial lighting? Is he also aware that the local education authority included it in a minor works programme, but that his Ministry has halved that programme, which is delaying the progress of this authority? Will he look at these projects in a more favourable light?

Sir D. Eccles: When I get this scheme, I shall look at it urgently, but the school seems to have done well in respect of the hon. Gentleman.

Durham

Mr. Ainsley: asked the Minister of Education what was the total amount of work submitted, and the figure approved, for the minor capital works programme for 1961–62 and 1962–63 by the Durham County Education Committee.

Sir D. Eccles: The authority origin ally asked for allocations of£450,000 for each of these years. It spent about£156,000 between 1st April and 30th September, 1961, and under current

arrangements can spend a further£220,000 up to 31st March, 1963, without counting works costing less than£2,000.

Mr. Willey: Can the right hon. Gentleman say when he will be able to make a more specific statement about the minor works programme, and whether he will be able to remove the effect of these cuts altogether?

Sir D. Eccles: I should like to be able to make it shortly, but we shall have to wait to see how the economic circumstances go.

Mr. Ainsley: Is the Minister aware of the feeling of discontent among the county education authorities in regard to these cuts in the minor works programme of over 50 per cent.? Is he aware that only yesterday the county authority declared an increase of Is. 6d. in its rates, and also that there is a limit to the rate call to be borne by the local authorities which is being shed by the central authority? Is it not a matter of neglect by the Government? Surely, the sins of the fathers are now being felt by these children?

Sir D. Eccles: All authorities regret that the minor works allocation has been cut. The second part of the hon. Gentleman's Question raises a very different issue.

Northumberland

Mr. McKay: asked the Minister of Education what were his grounds for reducing the Northumberland County Education Authority's allocation of£225,000 per annum for the two years ended March, 1961, for minor works to£100,000 per year from 1st October, 1961, to March, 1963; what consultations he had with the county authorities; and whether he made a survey to find out the needs of the county before the decision was made.

Sir D. Eccles: I announced last July that allocations for minor works would have to be reduced as part of the Government's financial measures. No special survey of the county's needs was made, but my officers corresponded with those of the authority before the reduction in Northumberland's allocation was announced.

Mr. McKay: Is the Minister aware that I sought information from the Director of Education on what consultations had been made and that he tells me that the only consultation was in this letter, consisting of nothing but figures? Is he further aware that if it is necessary to cut down educational finance, we surely do not simply cut it down by the same average without considering the individual needs of each county and whether the estimate of one county is in harmony with the urgent needs of that county? The Minister has made no examination of Northumberland. Is there not mare urgency there than in some other districts, and should it not get a bigger allocation? The Minister seems to have a slipshod method of fixing these things.

Sir D. Eccles: I understand the hon. Gentleman's anxiety, but I can assure him that we do our best to take the relative needs of each local education authority into consideration in apportioning the minor works allocation.

Brierton County Modern Schools, West Hartlepool

Commander Kerans: asked the Minister of Education what steps his Department are taking to reduce overcrowding in the Brierton County Modern Schools in West Hartlepool; and whether he will make a statement.

Sir D. Eccles: The local education authority are being informed today that a new secondary school for 450 children is being included in the 1963–64 building programme. This will relieve the overcrowding at Brierton.

Secondary and Primary Schools (Teacher-Pupil Ratio)

Mrs. White: asked the Minister of Education what is the present average teacher-pupil ratio in maintained secondary schools and primary schools, respectively.

Sir D. Eccles: The pupil-teacher ratios in January, 1961, were 28·6 in maintained primary—including all-age—schools and 20·4 in maintained secondary schools. These ratios take account of full-time equivalent of part-time teachers.

Mrs. White: Is the Minister not aware that in the independent secondary schools the ratio is said to be thirteen or thereabouts? With the acute shortage of teachers, has he considered suggesting a voluntary quota for the independent schools?

Sir D. Eccles: No, Sir. I think that the independent schools are what they say they are—independent.

Mr. Holland: In view of the very wide range of intellectual ability, which is much wider in primary classes than in later classes, cannot the Minister take steps to bring down the size of primary classes into better relationship with those of secondary classes? There is a much wider range of ability in primary than in secondary classes.

Sir D. Eccles: It is my aim to bring down this ratio, but we are in great difficulties owing to the exceptional wastage of women teachers from the primary schools.

Teachers (Retirement Pensions)

Mr. Symonds: asked the Minister of Education what annual pension a schoolmaster and teacher retiring on full basic pension in 1945, in 1950, in 1955, and in 1960, respectively, would now be receiving; and what percentage of the 1961 basic maximum salary these pensions represent.

Sir D. Eccles: As the Answer contains sixteen figures, I will, with permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Symonds: Will the Minister bring to the notice of the Chancellor of the Exchequer the great hardship which these persons are undergoing at present owing to the smallness of their pensions? Will he bring it to the notice of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in order that he may deal with it when he introduces his Budget in April?

Sir D. Eccles: My right hon. and learned Friend has to consider the needs of a great number of pensioners, and he always has them in mind.

Following is the information:
For a woman teacher employed outside London who retired on 31st August after forty years' service the figures are, respectively,£262,£286,£284 and£436 per annum. These pensions represent 22, 24, 24 and 37 per cent. of


the maximum basic salary for a two-year trained teacher under the 1961 Burnham Report. The corresponding figures for a man are£324,£352,£354 and£470 per annum, and 28, 30, 30 and 40 per cent.

Mr. Wade: asked the Minister of Education why, under his regulations, Mr. M. B. Spence, of 65, Crosland Road, Oakes, Huddersfield, who is due to retire from the teaching profession at the age of 65 years, will have two years less pensionable service to his credit, the facts being that he was engaged on war, service in the years 1917–19 and that he could not gain acceptance for admission to a recognised training college during the 1914–18 war because of his liability for war service.

Sir D. Eccles: Mr. Spence did not satisfy the conditions laid down in the rules governing the treatment for pension purposes of 1914–18 war service done by intending teachers. The rules are statutory and I have no power to waive or vary them.

Mr. Wade: Will the Minister look into this case to make quite sure that there is no mistake? In a letter from his Ministry to the local education committee, a copy of which was sent to me by Mr. Spence, it states,
According to information before the Ministry Mr. Spence left school in 1919.
In view of the fact that he joined the Army in 1917, that cannot very well be correct.

Sir D. Eccles: I have looked into this and I have found that Mr. Spence was a pupil teacher before joining the Army.

Dr. King: Is the Minister aware that for nearly ten years we on this side of the House have been trying to persuade him and his predecessors to take the power which he has to change the rules which at present penalise some old teachers merely because they served this country in the First World War? As these men have now reached the age at which they are drawing their depleted pensions, will he not again give his consideration to the point?

Sir D. Eccles: The answer to that supplementary question is the answer to the next Question.

Mr. Wade: asked the Minister of Education whether he will introduce legislation to provide that teachers who,

owing to war service in the 1914–18 war, were prevented from being admitted to or accepted for admission to a recognised training college until after the termination of their war service, shall for the purposes of calculating their superannuation benefits, be placed on the same footing as those who had been admitted, or accepted for admission, to a recognised training college.

Sir D. Eccles: No, Sir. Under the present rules, which were accepted by the teachers' representatives in 1926 as final, teachers are more favourably treated in this respect than other public servants.

Mr. Wade: Is there not an anomaly? A man whose desire always has been to go into teaching applies to be accepted for admission to a training college in 1916. He is told that if he is fit for war service he will not be accepted. He is passed as fit, joins the Forces and serves from 1917 to 1919. He then goes into the teaching profession, and he has been there ever since. Now, when he is about to retire, he is told that his pension rights have been reduced because he was not accepted for admission before joining the Forces.

Sir D. Eccles: It is an established principle of public service pensions schemes that account should be taken of war service only when this occurs after a person has entered pensionable civil employment. That rule was stretched for teachers, because when they entered a teacher-training college they were allowed to count that part of their training towards their pension.

Mr. Wade: If he had been accepted for admission, even though he had not actually entered a college, his pension rights would have been retained, but his rights are reduced simply because he could not be accepted because they would not accept him if he were fit for war service. Surely that is ridiculous.

Sir D. Eccles: I do not see how we could put everybody back in the position he would have been in if there had not been a war.

Psychologists

Mr. Scott-Hopkins: asked the Minister of Education whether he will state the number of qualified educational


psychologists at present employed by local education authorities in England and Wales.

Mr. K. Thompson: The number is 269.

Mr. Scott-Hopkins: Is my hon. Friend satisfied that that is enough to cover the whole country? May I suggest that it is nothing like enough and that unless he increases these numbers there is no possibility of knowing exactly the size of the problem of educational psychology in our schools? This is a matter of the utmost urgency. Will he get a move on and do something about it?

Mr. Thompson: My hon. Friend is quite right and I accept his sense of urgency in this matter. We are trying to increase the number of educational psychologists available in the service.

Mr. Scott-Hopkins: What is my hon. Friend doing about it?

Mr. Thompson: There is an additional training course for those wishing to become educational psychologists starting at the University of Manchester. We are introducing some new and revised financial arrangements which we hope will encourage local authorities to second teachers for this training.

Gypsies

Mr. Dodds: asked the Minister of Education if he will make a further statement on the experience gained from the special class for gypsy children at the Stone Church of England Primary School; and what consideration is being given to an extension of this form of approach in Kent and other counties of England and Wales so as to deal effectively with some of the human problems involved.

Sir D. Eccles: The experience of this class confirms that sympathetic treatment at an ordinary school is suitable for gypsy children. This is the general view of local education authorities who have to deal with this problem.

Mr. Dodds: While thanking the Minister for the excellent report and congratulating the headmaster and the staff on their wonderful work, may I ask the Minister whether he does not agree that it underlines the need for a special approach, if we are to catch up with the backlog of neglect, when so often

the need is first to teach social behaviour before teaching the alphabet? Is it not wrong, as so often happens, to put a ten-year-old gypsy boy into a school with ten-year-olds who attend regularly? This is often done, with very disappointing results?

Sir D. Eccles: As the hon. Member knows, the first thing is to get hold of the gypsy children. I believe that teachers are very sympathetic when these children come into their schools.

Mr. Awbery: Is the Minister aware that the problem of gypsies is a great problem in a large number of constituencies? Will he not circularise education authorities throughout the country asking them to deal with the problem of teaching them on similar lines to those outlined in the Question?

Sir D. Eccles: My estimation is that the education authorities are very well aware of this problem.

Mr. Dodds: Is the Minister aware that this is the only example of its kind? Is it not a case that one can go to school after school and see an odd gypsy child in each, often very much out of place? Do we not need this special approach?

Sir D. Eccles: We cannot have a special class unless we can get enough gypsy children to make one.

Spelling Reform

Sir Richard Pilkington: asked the Minister of Education what consideration was given at the recent Commonwealth Education Conference at Delhi to a gradual reform of English spelling.

Sir D. Eccles: The Conference stessed the importance of English as a means of Commonwealth and world communication, but there was no suggestion that its development was hindered by spelling.

Sir Richard Pilkington: Does not my right hon. Friend agree that it would be the biggest boost to the English language if spelling were simplified? In view of the fact that the Government are taking the initiative in so many different things these days, will he not do so in this matter?

Sir D. Eccles: I must tell my hon. Friend that I have a certain prejudice in favour of English as she is spelled now.

Sir J. Pitman: Does not the Minister agree, without prejudice to that prejudice, (that the advantage of the alphabet lies only in the learning process, and if it is discovered in this country that the learning process is fostered by developing the alphabet alphabetic ally, as it were, would it not be a good thing to use it also for the process of learning the English language, having regard to the fact that "on" spells "on," that "ce" spells "ki", or "see" but that o-n-c-e spells neither "onke" nor "onsee" but "wuns"? Pity the poor foreigner!

Sir D. Eccles: My hon. Friend's interest in this matter is well-known and appreciated. He has initiated some experiments to which he knows I have given my support.

Dr. King: In spite of the Minister's prejudices, many of which we on this side know very well, will he devote his very careful attention, as he has just suggested he might, to the experiments which have been conducted by the University of London into the teaching of spelling by means of a reformed alphabet?

Sir D. Eccles: Yes, I will.

Mr. Peyton: I welcome my right hon. Friend's prejudice in favour of English as she is spoken and spelled now. Will he do his best to spread and communicate this prejudice throughout Whitehall?

Exceptionally Gifted Children

Mr. Short: asked the Minister of Education what consideration he has given to recently published research by Hollingworth, Robb and others, a copy of which has been sent to him, on the educational handicaps suffered by children with I.Qs. of over 175; how many such children he has estimated there are in England and Wales; and how he proposes to make adequate provision for them.

Sir D. Eccles: I read with interest recent articles about exceptionally gifted children, in one of which the author

estimated that between 25 and 50 children in England and Wales have an I.Q. above 175. Local education authorities and schools are alive to the needs of highly intelligent children, including the ablest, and I doubt if it is desirable to segregate them.

Mr. Short: Have the Minister's research people really gone into this? Do they agree with the American view now that this small group of children should be regarded as educationally handicapped? They make a nuisance of themselves in class and are very unhappy? Does he not think that there is much to be said for setting up a small residential unit for this group of super geniuses? Will he at any rate refer this matter to the National Foundation for Educational Research?

Sir D. Eccles: I have consulted the Foundation. Dr. Wall estimates that the number of children with I.Q.s over 175 is one or two in a million, which is rather different from the estimate I gave before. On this issue I am really not in favour of departing from comprehensive education.

Mr. Willey: Can the Minister tell us how many Members of the House have an I.Q. of 175 or more?

Mr. Speaker: There is an age limit here and so it does not arise on this Question.

Mr. Short: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I give notice that I shall seek an opportunity to raise the matter on the Adjournment

All-Age Schools, Hampshire

Dr. King: asked the Minister of Education how many all-age schools remain in Hampshire.

Sir D. Eccles: Two, of which one will be reorganised very shortly on the opening of the Hayling County Secondary School.

Dr. King: Is the Minister aware that the surviving one is a Roman Catholic School in which children aged from 11 to 15 spend the whole of their secondary school life in two classrooms? There is no provision for handicraft. There is no domestic science room. There are


none of the amenities of secondary-modern education. These children are being deprived of their birthright. Will the right hon. Gentleman do what he can to expedite the demand of the Roman Catholic community that this school appears in an early school building programme?

Sir D. Eccles: Yes. I have looked at this school. I agree that it should be reorganised, but I understand that there have been some difficulties about finding a site.

Newcastle-upon-Tyne

Mr. Short: asked the Minister of Education what reductions he has made in the minor works programme of the Newcastle-upon-Tyne local education authority; and why such reductions have been made.

Sir D. Eccles: I announced last July that allocations for minor works would have to be reduced as part of the Governments financial measures. The effect in Newcastle is that their minor works expenditure in 1961–63 will amount to£37,000 contracted for in the first six months of 1961–62,£60,000 for the rest of the two-year period and a further sum at the authority's discretion for projects costing less than£2,000 each. This replaces the previous allocations of£85,000 and£110,000 for all minor works in the two years.

Mr. Short: Is the Minister aware that that is a reduction of more than 50 per cent.? Why has he turned down the request of the Education Committee to increase this by£10,000? Is he aware that in an old city like this there are a great many old schools which need to be brought up to standard? We are very grateful for this slight help with the items under£2,000, but does he not realise that this is inadequate to bring the old schools up-to-date? Can he not review the matter?

Sir D. Eccles: I will review it just as soon as I can have a larger allocation.

Statistics, Wales

Mrs. White: asked the Minister of Education if he will publish in the OFFICIAL REPORT the figures for local education authorities in Wales, normally

included in the selected statistics published by his Department, to the latest possible date.

Sir D. Eccles: The figures for which the hon. Lady asks are now with the printers and will be published in about two weeks. I will send the hon. Lady a copy as soon as I possibly can.

Mrs. White: Is the Minister aware that at present the only figures one can obtain for individual education authorities are those to 1st January, 1959? I believe that the figures he has just referred to will be only to 1st January, 1960, in other words, still more than two years out of date. Can he not do something to speed up the statistical division of his Department?

Sir D. Eccles: I regret the delay, but in this case it is due to turning over to a new system of statistics. Therefore, I hope that it will not happen again.

Mrs. White: How quickly shall we be able to obtain these statistics in future? Will they always be more than one year behind time?

Sir D. Eccles: We shall do better than we have done in the past. That is the object of the reorganisation.

Sunderland

Mr. Willey: asked the Minister of Education what was the original allocation for minor works from 1961 to 1963 for the Sunderland Education Authority; and what is the revised allocation for that period.

Sir D. Eccles: Minor works expenditure in Sunderland in 1961–63 will amount to£57,000 contracted for in the first six months of 1961–62,£30,000 for the rest of the two-year period, and a further sum at the authority's discretion for projects costing less than£2,000 each. This replaces the previous allocations of£50,000 and£60,000 for all minor works in the two years.

Mr. Willey: Does the right hon. Gentleman appreciate that this is a deplorable economy, in view of the disparities between the old and new schools in Sunderland? Does he further realise that this economy takes a very real toll of manpower, technical and administrative, which is in short supply?

Sir D. Eccles: These cuts in minor works were made precisely because at the time the building industry was overloaded and this was the part of the educational programme where relief could be most quickly given.

Essex

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Minister of Education What is the approximate number and percentage of grammar school pupils in the administrative county of Essex, and in the Whole country, who are annually considered either to be unsuitable for such type of education or have been transferred to other types of schools and what is, in both cases, the approximate number of secondary modern school pupils who are annually transferred to grammar schools.

Sir D. Eccles: The local education authority tell me that between one and two per cent. of thirteen-year-old pupils in Essex have in recent years been transferred from modern to grammar or technical schools. Transfers in the reverse direction are negligible. No comparable statistics are collected for the country as a whole.

Mr. Sorensen: Does the absence of any figures showing how many have been transferred from grammar schools to other types of schools mean that a large number are unsuitable for this kind of education? Is there not abundant evidence to indicate that the 11-plus examination is both unsuitable and deceptive as a means of determining the type of future education children should undergo? In these circumstances, what is being done about it?

Sir D. Eccles: The arrangements for transfer are entirely within the discretion of the local authority. The hon. Gentleman will appreciate that promotion is much easier than demotion. I do not think it is fair to say that the 11-plus examination is working unfairly.

Mr. Sorensen: It is. There are a certain number—quite a large number in some cases—of boys and girls in grammar schools who would be better off in other kinds of secondary education, and vice versa.

Mrs. White: Before the Minister replies to my hon. Friend, may I ask him if he agrees that one of the arguments for comprehensive education is that such transfers downwards in that system do

not create difficulties for children who would be very much better off not in a grammar school?

Sir D. Eccles: I have no figures to show how many children might be eligible for demotion, but I should think the number is very small.

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Minister of Education if he will consult representatives of both the education committees and appropriate professional organisations in the geographical County of Essex on the most suitable form of local government re-organisation in respect of education.

Sir D. Eccles: I am always ready to consider views which may be put to me on this topic by such persons and bodies.

Mr. Sorensen: Is not that a rather negative and passive reply? Does not the right hon. Gentleman appreciate that, as education has very special characteristics which might be affected by local government reorganisation, he should himself initiate consultations with all bodies intimately concerned with education so that he, having received representations from them, could bring to bear some influence on the Minister now engaged in local government reorganisation in the Greater London area?

Sir D. Eccles: I have looked at the evidence which all these bodies gave to the Herbert Committee. I assume that they would stand by what they said. If they wish to write to me on the recommendations of the Committee, modified by the White Paper, I am ready to hear what they have to say.

Mr. Lagden: Will my right hon. Friend give an undertaking that, if he does see representatives of the Essex Education Committee, he will, at the same time, see elected representatives as well as officials?

Sir D. Eccles: If they have any views, I would much prefer them to write to me in the first instance.

Cardiff

Mr. Callaghan: asked the Minister of Education if he can yet state his decision on the proposal for rebuilding St. Illtyds College, Cardiff, and for increasing the capacity of the county secondary schools and primary infants schools at Llanrumney and Rumney, Cardiff.

Sir D. Eccles: The rebuilding of St. Illtyd's College can start in 1962–63. Extensions to the Llanrumney Boys' and Llanrumney Girls' and Caer Castell County Secondary Schools, together with the provision of a new primary school, are included in the authority's 1963–64 building programme, particulars of which it should have received today.

Mr. Callaghan: While I thank the Minister for his reply and his civility, can he tell me—as this is the fourth time I have put down a Question on the subject—how many of the 1,220 places for which the local authority have asked will be met?

Sir D. Eccles: I must have notice of that question.

School Building Costs

Mr. A. Lewis: asked the Minister of Education whether he will publish in HANSARD a table of figures giving, since 1951, the percentage annual rise in the cost of school building, taking 1951 as being equal to 100; and to what extent these rises in costs were responsible for the increase in expenditure on educational buildings from 1951–60.

Sir D. Eccles: With permission, I will publish a table in the OFFICIAL REPORT giving, year by year, an index of cost per school place and an index of work done on all educational building. It shows that between 1951 and 1961 the cost of a school place increased by a quarter, while value of work done more than doubled.

Following is the information:


Calendar Year
Index of building cost per school place at actual prices on tender
index of work done on all educational building at actual prices





(1951=100)
(1951=100)


1951
…
…
100
100


1952
…
…
97
110


1953
…
…
98
122


1954
…
…
100
120


1955
…
…
104
124


1956
…
…
109
162


1957
…
…
107
198


1958
…
…
106
186


1959
…
…
107
182


1960
…
…
113
174


1961
…
…
125
209

Edinburgh Medical Student (Grant)

Dr. A. Thompson: asked the Minister of Education in view of the changed financial circumstances of the Edinburgh medical student, details of whom have been sent to him by the honourable Member for Dunfermline Burghs, if he will investigate the possibility of an increased educational grant to enable him to complete his studies.

Sir D. Eccles: I will write to the hon. Member when I have consulted the Kent local education authority about the details of this student's case. I sympathise with the student concerned, and I much regret that his parents should have refused to support him because he has become a Roman Catholic.

Dr. Thompson: May I thank the Minister for that reply, and urge upon him the need for quick action? Since this student has had his allowance cancelled he has been left completely penniless and has had to work 17 hours a day at a canning factory in order to pursue his medical studies. I should be grateful for quick action.

Sir D. Eccles: If the hon. Gentleman will leave it to me and to the Kent Authority, we will see what we can do.

Oral Answers to Questions — AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD

South Africa (Sugar Agreement)

Mr. Brockway: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what are the terms of the bilateral sugar agreement recently concluded with South Africa.

The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Christopher Soames): The terms of this agreement were set out in my written reply to my honourable friend the Member for Edinburgh, West (Mr. Stodart) on 15th November last.

Mr. Brockway: But do not those terms show that this year we are making a subsidy of£2,700,000 to the Republic of South Africa? When within the Commonwealth we have countries like Jamaica—and the West Indies generally—and Mauritius, which are sugar-producing countries and in which heavy unemployment is leading to emigration


to this country, would it not be much better to concentrate on those territories now that South Africa is outside the Commonwealth?

Mr. Soames: No, Sir. What it shows is that we have for a long time now had a long-term agreement with South Africa to purchase sugar, and it would not be in the interests of our trading relations with South Africa or, indeed, in the wider interests, or the interests of the producers in Swaziland if this payment was reduced very rapidly. In all the circumstances, we have made a most reasonable agreement with South Africa.

Sir C. Osborne: If we boycotted South African goods, would not the South African retaliate? Would we not lose exports, and would not our industrial workers suffer as a consequence?

Mr. Soames: I am able to tell my hon. Friend that that is a purely hypothetical question.

Milk Bottles (Caps)

Mr. J. P. W. Mallalieu: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether, in order to curtail the spread of disease by birds, he will ask milk distributors to fit plastic, instead of silver paper, caps on all milk bottles.

The Joint-Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. W. M. F. Vane): No, Sir. I am advised by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health that he has no medical evidence that would warrant this action.

Mr. Mallalieu: Has the Minister any evidence at all of the great nuisance this is? If he lived in the countryside himself he would know that this is happening every day, and he would know of the very strong feeling there is among country people that disease is produced in this way, and that a great deal of milk is wasted as a consequence?

Mr. Vane: There is no medical evidence to warrant the suggested change. It is true that birds, in their search for food, have discovered that the coloured tops of milk bottles lead them in the direction of something they want, but a very strong case would have to

be put up before it was suggested that any substitute for aluminium foil should be employed, and aluminium foil is very useful for this purpose.

Mr. Hayman: Could the hon. Gentleman not arrange with his right hon. Friend to set up some sort of inquiry into the possibility of disease being spread in this way? As he knows, disease is widespread throughout the country?

Mr. Vane: Some attention has certainly been given to this matter, but the evidence is that there is no widespread disease.

Brucellosis

Mr. H. Hynd: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what further consideration he has given to the problem of brucellosis in cattle; and if he will now prohibit the sale of a suspected animal until suspicion is cleared.

Mr. Vane: As I explained to the hon. Member on 7th December and subsequently in correspondence, our policy is to attack this disease by means of calfhood vaccination, and my right hon. Friend is starting a free calf vaccination service on 1st May next. We are satisfied that movement controls, apart from those imposed by the Epizootic Abortion Order, 1922, would not be practicable or useful at the present time.

Mr. Hynd: Is the Parliamentary Secretary aware that vaccination does nothing to prevent milk passing on infection to human beings? Has he studied foreign legislation on the point; for example, the regulations in New York? Why does he defend a system that enables an animal known to be infected to be sold?

Mr. Vane: We have, of course, studied foreign legislation but, at the present time, movement controls of themselves would not be of practical value because, since vaccination has taken place at varying ages according to the herd concerned, it is very difficult to identify the infected cattle, and without identifying all the infected cattle it is not possible to operate a system of eradication. After several years of vaccination of


calves, things may change when further steps may be taken.

Mr. Hynd: Owing to the unsatisfactory nature of that reply, I beg to give notice that I will seek to raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Income and Output

Sir J. Maitland: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will state for each year since 1950 the production and the net income of the agricultural industry; and if he will present the figures in such a form that they can be compared with the relationship between income and productivity recently set out in the Command Paper entitled Incomes Policy: The Next Step.

Mr. Soames: I will, with permission, circulate in the OFFICIAL REPORT a table showing the index of agricultural net output together with figures of the industry's income from 1950 to 1960. This shows that net output rose by 19 per cent., the incomes of those contributing to it, i.e. farmers, farmworkers and landowners, 26 per cent., and the incomes of farmers by themselves, 32 per cent. The Command Paper on Incomes Policy, to which my hon. and gallant Friend refers, is concerned with general principles for the economy as a whole.

Sir J. Maitland: Cannot the general principles be applied to an industry about which the Government have every economic detail?

Mr. Soames: Yes, but this principle is one which is for the economy as a whole, as opposed to individual industries.

Mr. Fernyhough: Can the right hon. Gentleman also say what the pre-centage increase was in the subsidies over the same period?

Mr. Soames: No, Sir, not without notice.

Sir C. Osborne: How do these increases both in production and income compare with the industrial figures?

Mr. Soames: Again, I would need notice of that question in order to compare it with the rest of the economy as a whole.

The following is the information:


—
Index of Agricultural Net Output
Income of Agricultural Industry†
Aggregate Farming Net Income*




(Pre-war average= 100)*
£ million
£ million


1950
…
145
610
273


1951
…
149
637
329½


1952
…
153
679
340


1953
…
156
687
338


1954
…
152
674
302½


1955
…
156
690
337½


1956
…
161
708
327


1957
…
162
737
363½


1958
…
161
740
323


1959
…
169
746
356


1960 (Provisional)
…
172
767
359

Notes:

* Years beginning 1st June.

†Calendar years. These figures give the combined income of farmers, landowners and workers, after providing for depreciation

These figures are for the United Kingdom.

QUESTIONS

Mr. Frank Allaun: asked the Prime Minister if he will arrange for a trial period to have Departmental answers to all Oral Questions circulated to all hon. Members on the day they are due for answer but before Question Hour, as suggested in the recent book by Mr. D. N. Chester and Mrs. Bowring, namely. "Questions in Parliament," a copy of which has been sent to him.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Harold Macmillan): No, Sir.

Mr. Allaun: Would not this procedure have the two big advantages that it would provide more time for Questions within the hour, and would also help hon. Members to make their supplementary questions more relevant to Ministerial replies?

The Prime Minister: In this contest of wits, I think that it would be rather unfair if the questioner had the advantage of a full day with the reply before preparing his ex tempore supplementary questions.

Mr. Gaitskell: Is the Prime Minister aware that most of us would prefer some element of surprise to remain in respect of Ministerial Answers?

Oral Answers to Questions — MINISTERS (RESPONSIBILITIES)

Mr. Donnelly: asked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the increasing burdens upon Ministers, he will now announce steps to alleviate these burdens.

The Prime Minister: Since I formed my Administration I have made a number of disposition to alleviate the burden on senior Ministers. These arrangements are working well.

Mr. Donnelly: Regarding the double banking of some Ministers, has the Prime Minister studied the criticism of this sort of proposal made by the right hon. Member for Woodford (Sir W. Churchill) in 1935, when Mr. Eden was made Minister for League of Nations Affairs; and, in particular, the reference the right hon. Gentleman made to Mr. Lloyd George's statement that it was not a question of whether one general was better than another but whether one general was better than two generals? To borrow a phrase from the Prime Minister's own particular vocabulary of rudeness, does he say that two Ministerial disused slag-heaps are better than one?

Mr. Shinwell: Surely the Prime Minister will agree that there is a very simple answer to this problem, and that he can draw the conclusion?

The Prime Minister: I was about to point out that, while we are very grateful for the sympathy, all these burdens are, after all, self-imposed.

Oral Answers to Questions — NUCLEAR TESTS

Mr. Driberg: asked the Prime Minister if he has considered the representation, forwarded to him by the hon. Member for Barking, containing the views expressed by Sir Robert Watson-Watt on the joint resumption of nuclear testing by Her Majesty's Government and the United States Government; and if he will make a statement.

The Prime Minister: I have considered the hon. Member's representation, and I give to the scientific views of Sir Robert Watson-Watt the respect which is due to the opinions of so eminent a scientist.

But on the question of the possible resumption of nuclear tests I must take the advice of those scientists who alone have access to all the relevant information, much of which must inevitably be secret.

Mr. Driberg: Would the Prime Minister agree that radar is highly relevant to the whole nuclear complex, and particularly to the tracking, plotting and identification of missiles? When these grave decisions are being taken, are the arguments for and against weighed up very thoroughly and carefully? If so, can the right hon. Gentleman say what estimate he was provided with, in that grim balance-sheet, of the number of new cases of leukaemia, bone cancer, and genetic damage likely to result from the Christmas Island tests?

The Prime Minister: All these matters are most carefully weighed and balanced at very considerable length, and I have every confidence in the Government's scientific advisers.

Mr. Gaitskell: Would the Prime Minister not agree that it really is desirable that the Geneva talks should have some chance of success before a final decision is taken by the United States Government on the resumption of atmospheric tests?

The Prime Minister: That is quite another matter. I am asked in this Question whether I will listen to the views of Sir Robert Watson-Watt.

Sir A. V. Harvey: Is my right hon. Friend aware that Sir Robert Watson-Watt has been given full credit for what he did for Britain in the war, but that his team of assistants, who helped him greatly, have never been given that credit and are still living in this country?

Mr. S. Silverman: Would the Prime Minister at least agree that Sir Robert Watson-Watt has provided some evidence to show that a campaign against nuclear strategy is not necessarily prejudicial to the safety or interests of the State?

The Prime Minister: That is his view.

Mr. Gaitskell: Would the Prime Minister not agree, since the Question is about Sir Robert Watson-Watt's views on the resumption of nuclear tests, that relevant to that issue is the question of


whether there should not first of all be talks at Geneva before a decision is taken?

The Prime Minister: No, Sir. I understood Sir Robert Watson-Watt's view to say that they were quite unnecessary at any time.

Mr. Driberg: asked the Prime Minister if he has now discussed further with the President of the United States the possible resumption of nuclear testing by Britain and America; what further communications he has received from other Powers capable now, or in the near future, of conducting such tests; and if he will now state when it is intended that British or American testing shall again take place.

The Prime Minister: I am in constant touch with the President of the United States, but, of course, my communications with him are confidential.
As to the second part of the Question, the only Powers other than ourselves and the United States known to be capable of conducting nuclear tests are France and the Soviet Union. The House will be aware of the communications I have exchanged with Mr. Khrushchev, since they have been published. We have naturally been in touch with our French allies over this question.
As to the third part of the Question, I referred in my statement of 8th February to the proposed testing of a British nuclear device underground in Nevada. I am advised that the preparations for this test are virtually complete. The Americans have already been conducting a series of underground tests. On atmospheric tests, I can add nothing to my statement of 8th February.

Mr. Driberg: Even though these communications are confidential, have not the people of this country and of the world some right to know the answer to the latter part of my previous supplementary question, which the Prime Minister did not answer: what sort of human damage may result from this new series of tests? Is not there any information about that? If not, how can the Prime Minister contradict the views of these eminent scientists, and how does he dare go ahead and impose this new suffering on the human race in the mad

race towards a probably mythical ultimate weapon?

The Prime Minister: Of course, very complete information exists, and I think that the British Medical Council's Report has been circulated and read by most hon. Members. It was published after the last Russian tests.

Mr. Gaitskell: Does the Prime Minister not agree that the only possibly satisfactory answer to this problem is a multilateral agreement to ban nuclear tests everywhere—

Mr. S. Silverman: Ban the weapon.

Mr. Gaitskell: —as a first step towards a more general disarmament agreement? That being so, would the right hon. Gentleman now answer my earlier question as to whether the Geneva talks should take place first, without a final decision being taken concerning the resumption of atmospheric tests?

The Prime Minister: At the moment, I have nothing to add to my statement.

Mr. Goodhew: Will my right hon. Friend bear in mind that while everyone is as anxious as hon. Gentlemen opposite that nuclear tests should stop as soon as possible, the vast majority of people still look to Her Majesty's Government for protection and do not expect to see this country allowed to fall behind?

The Prime Minister: Of course, the balance of power is one of the vital points in this problem.

Mr. Shinwell: Can the Prime Minister say when the British tests at Nevada will actually begin and whether they will be prolonged?

The Prime Minister: No. I have nothing to add to what I just said; that the position is that we are to do this test and it will be done very shortly. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."]

Mr. Mendelson: Does the Prime Minister not recall that when the Russians conducted their tests there was virtually unanimous agreement in the House and in the country in condemnation of them? Would it not be in our best interests to see to it that the Geneva Conference has a fair start and has a


chance of succeeding, without the tests being imminent when the Conference begins its work, so that we may have public opinion on our side in the pursuance of a peaceful policy?

The Prime Minister: Of course, these are very relevant considerations.

Oral Answers to Questions — REGULAR AND COLONIAL SERVICE PENSIONERS

Dame Irene Ward: asked the Prime Minister whether he will arrange a meeting, under his chairmanship, of ex-Colonial Secretaries no longer holding Cabinet appointments, ex-Ministers of Service Departments, representatives of senior retired Service personnel and representative Members of Parliament to discuss the pension position of retired Regular service pensioners and retired Colonial Service pensioners.

The Prime Minister: No, Sir. I am always interested to know the views of those who have had experience of the matters to which my hon. Friend refers, but these questions must remain the responsibility of Governments.

Dame Irene Ward: Why is it, when my right hon. Friend always speaks so movingly about his survival in the First World Wax and when he is talking to the rail way men he refers to the slaughter at Passchendaele, which he and I both remember, that he finds it so impossible to do anything for the people who made his survival, which was most important, certain? Has he read the speech of Lord Boyd in the House of Lords on the colonial pensioners, and does he intend to accept the view of a Cabinet Minister who obviously was "sat on" by the Cabinet in the views he genuinely felt about his own people? Can the Prime Minister take any action?

The Prime Minister: I have and will consider all these matters, but, of course, this has always been a problem, and no Government which has so far studied this problem, however sympathetically, has ever been able to apply current pension improvements retrospectively.

Dame Irene Ward: Will any Government ever do so?

Mr. Bellenger: Does the right hon. Gentleman think that unaided he is able

to decide who representative hon. Members of Parliament are?

The Prime Minister: No, but I might, perhaps, ask for Mr. Speaker's assistance.

Mr. Tilney: Is the Prime Minister aware that from time to time large sums of the British taxpayers' money are either given or loaned to colonial or ex-colonial Governments, some of whom have paid no attention to the possibility of lifting the pensions of their ex-servants to the level or those who stayed at home in the United Kingdom? Does he not think that this is hardly a good advertisement in the future for servants of the Crown overseas?

The Prime Minister: Of course, all these matters have been going on and axe matters of negotiation, but it is very important that we should firmly, when negotiations for independence are taking place, put the burden and the responsibility on the successor Government.

Mr. Wade: Since in an earlier reply the Prime Minister said that this is the responsibility of the Government, can he say what the Government are proposing to do?

The Prime Minister: That is another question. If the hon. Gentleman will put it down, then, of course, I will answer it.

Sir H. Oakshott: In retrospect, can the Prime Minister recall that not long ago this House passed the Overseas Service Act which made generous provision for a great many overseas civil servants? I think I am right in saying that that will cost this country about£160 millions over ten years. Therefore, a great deal has been done about which we may be proud.

The Prime Minister: Yes, Sir. It would be a great mistake if it were to go outside this House that the Houses of Parliament have not been willing to accept very heavy responsibilities.

Mr. Woodburn: Would the right hon. Gentleman look into the whole question as to whether pensioners axe the proper people to pay for inflation, because, after all, inflation is making a reduction in the real pensions? Why should they suffer for something for which they have no responsibility?

The Prime Minister: It would be equally dangerous to create a situation in this country when, instead of us all trying to get together to stop inflation, it was generally regarded that it did not matter and we just paid ourselves out in paper money.

INCIDENTS, TRAFALGAR SQUARE (POLICE COMMISSIONER'S REPORT)

The following Questions stood upon the Order Paper:

Mrs. BUTLER: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what action he intends to take on the report of the Commissioner of Police following the inquiry into complaints of police conduct in Trafalgar Square on 17th September last; and whether he will make a statement.

Mr. GOODHART: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will now make a statement on the report of the Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis on the incidents in Trafalgar Square on 17th and 18th September, 1961.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. R. A. Butler): With permission, I will now answer Questions Nos. 67 and 71 together.
The Commissioner has caused each of the 54 specific complaints about incidents in Trafalgar Square and at the police stations to which arrested persons were taken to be thoroughly investigated by senior police officers not concerned in these incidents. Statements have been taken from over 400 police officers and over 50 private persons, in addition to those from the complainants themselves.
It is clear from a careful examination of all this evidence, including medical evidence, that, apart from a very few cases to which I shall refer, the great majority of the police officers concerned acted properly and indeed, in very difficult circumstances, with commendable restraint.
But towards the end of this long operation there appear to have been a few cases, during the clearance of the Square and afterwards, in which some officers fell short of this standard. In particular, it appears that four or,

possibly, five individuals were put in the fountain basins. [Laughter.] This was, of course, most improper. [Laughter.] Unfortunately, the complainants were unable to identify any officers concerned and most searching inquiries have failed to do so. A police sergeant has been admonished for allowing a hose to be turned on in the yard at Bow Street when some demonstrators were there, although it was not directed at them. A woman police sergeant has also been admonished for a remark to which objection could properly be taken. [Laughter.]
In compliance with the request by the right hon. Member for Smethwick (Mr. Gordon Walker) and the right hon. and learned Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice), copies of the Commissioner's detailed report have been given to the Royal Commission on the Police. The Commission will no doubt take this information fully into account in its examination of the general question of dealing with complaints by the public against the police; and on this question we can only await its final report.

Mr. Goodhart: In view of the deliberately provocative action of a certain element in the crowd, whom some of us saw at very close quarters, will my right hon. Friend underline the fact that the overwhelming majority of police behaved with commendable restraint? Can he say how many members of the public and of the police were injured in the disturbances?

Mr. Butler: I have studied the extremely voluminous report of the investigation made by the Commissioner and I fully endorse the view that the few and minor cases in which complaints have been found to be justified emphasise the patience and competence with which the police acted over a long and sustained action.
I should also like to tell the House that a number of policemen suffered bruising and other superficial injuries. According to our information, no member of the public was admitted to hospital, which I think the House will find a very satisfactory result. Police records show that only six members of the public asked for medical attention because of injury, and I am glad to say that all the injuries were slight and no one was admitted to hospital.

Mr. G. Brown: Is the House aware that one of the things that distinguishes a democracy like us from a Fascist country is that charges against the police are not here regarded as a laughing matter? Is the Home Secretary further aware that while we are, of course, convinced that the police behaved in the way that the Commissioner's inquiry has shown, nevertheless this is a case of the police inquirying into themselves? We have to remember this in judging the value of the report to ordinary people.
Will the right hon. Gentleman, therefore, in view of the last paragraph of his statement, arrange that the Royal Commission, if it thinks proper, shall be allowed to cross-examine the witnesses and the police on the evidence which has been tendered as a result of the Commissioner's inquiry?

Mr. Butler: I certainly think that the Royal Commission should have available to it not only the report, but any other information on this matter that it desires. The right hon. Gentleman will realise that the Commission is reporting on the general issue, namely, how future complaints should be handled. We shall be only too glad to have the Commission's report and to make available to the Commission any information to make its report worth while.
On the right hon. Gentleman's point about this being a laughing matter, I assure him and the House that the Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis and all those engaged have taken this matter extremely seriously. I may say, on their behalf, that they have regretted that they have not been able to identify some of the officers to whom I have referred. That does not detract in the least from my general tribute to the police. They would have been glad to identify any of those who had done wrong.

Mr. G. Brown: I am sure that there is no difference between the Home Secretary and myself about this. It was the reaction behind him that worried me. The only issue on which I rise again is that the right hon. Gentleman said that he is making the report available to the Royal Commission. The Commission is considering matters for the future. Will it also be allowed, since the right hon. Gentleman is to

make the report available, to go further into it if it is thought necessary?

Mr. Butler: I will certainly put myself in touch with the Chairman and ask whether there is any further information that he desires.

Mr. Deedes: Does my right hon. Friend not agree that one matter of general concern which emerges is whether the present methods of expressing grievances against the police by the public, or, perhaps, the other way round, are suitable?

Mr. Butler: Yes, and that would fall within the general terms of reference of the Royal Commission. That is why I thought it advisable to send the Commission the report.

Mr. Fernyhough: Can the Home Secretary say how it came about that some of those who had been arrested and required medical attention were compelled to pay for it? Is it the normal practice that when a man is arrested, even before he is tried and found guilty, he must pay for whatever medical attention he requires? Why were not these people given the facilities of the National Health Service, the same as everybody else?

Mr. Butler: If the hon. Member will bring particular cases to my attention, I will have them investigated.

Sir G. Nicholson: Are there not more remote and far-reaching issues involved in this matter? Would my right hon. Friend agree that incidents of this sort are always liable to recur when political or quasi-political demonstrations are allowed in the centre of London? Is it not time that demonstrations of this sort were held outside the central area and the central area kept free?

Mr. Butler: There are certain matters in regard to giving permission which fall within the discretion of my right hon. Friend the Minister of Works. That is the main control at present in the hands of the Government. I would only like to say, in general, that we have to walk between two extremes, one extreme being to stop the liberty of speech and the other to allow licence.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mr. Gaitskell: May I ask the Leader of the House whether he will announce the business for next week?

The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Mr. Iain Macleod): Yes, Sir. The business for next week will be as follows:
MONDAY, 5TH MARCH, and TUESDAY, 6TH MARCH—Debate on Defence, on the Government Motion inviting the House to approve the White Paper (Command No. 1639).
WEDNESDAY, 7TH MARCH—Consideration of a Timetable Motion for the Transport Bill, and the Housing (Scotland) Bill.
THURSDAY, 8TH MARCH—Supply [7th Allotted Day]: Army Estimates 1962–63, will be considered in Committee on Vote A.
FRIDAY, 9TH MARCH—Consideration of Private Members' Bills.
MONDAY, 12TH MARCH—The proposed business will be: Supply [8th Allotted Day]: Air Estimates 1962–63, consideration in Committee of Vote A.
It may be convenient for the House to know that my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer will open his Budget on MONDAY, 9TH APRIL.

Mr. Gaitskell: Why has the right hon. Gentleman decided to apply the Guillotine to these two further Bills? Is he aware that the Transport Bill, for example, is an extremely complicated Measure and that to have reached, as I understand the Committee has done, Clause 13 in twenty sittings is not bad progress, particularly as progress, under whatever Government or Opposition, has always been slow on the early Clauses? Are we now to understand that whenever Standing Committees make less progress than the Government think they would like, we are to have the Guillotine imposed?

Mr. Macleod: That is a very good précis of the opening speech for Wednesday's debate, when we shall be discussing these matters. As for the Transport Bill, I am sure that the right

hon. Gentleman will have studied—and if not, I recommend him to do so—the guillotine Motion on the Transport Bill in 1947. He will find that the Motion then introduced was a good deal more strict than the Motion which is now proposed. There have been 21 sittings of the Committee on the Transport Bill and 11 sittings of the Committee on the Housing (Scotland) Bill, and I do not believe that anybody who has sat on either of those two Committees is very surprised at the announcement which I have made.

Mr Smithers: On the business next week, may I ask my right hon. Friend whether he is likely to be able to find time for a Motion in my name and the names of many hon. Members on the underground storage of gas?

[That this House, in view of the considerations involved, legal, constitutional, economic, technical and strategic, and of considerations of public safety and amenities, calls upon Her Majesty's Government to set up an independent inquiry into the desirability, practicability and implications of the underground storage of gas in Great Britain; and is of opinion that pending the report of such an inquiry the Gas (Underground Storage) (Chilcomb) Bill, 1961, should be withdrawn.]

Mr. Macleod: Complex and important issues are involved in this and my right hon. Friend the Minister of Power is announcing today that he has decided to make a full examination of the general problem and to consider the procedures which should be followed in future. The Gas Council is issuing a statement this afternoon to say that after consultation with my right hon. Friend the Minister of Power it has decided to withdraw the Bill.

Mr. Smithers: On a point of order. This afternoon, at 4.30, Mr. Speaker, you will hold a Ballot on notices to raise matters on the Adjournment, and my name appears in it. In view of the satisfactory announcement which my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House has just made, may I ask you to withdraw my name from that Ballot?

Mr. Speaker: I am grateful to the hon. Member for generously giving me the opportunity to exclude the hon. Member in favour of others.

Mr. T. Fraser: Will the Leader of the House say why he intends to take up the time of the House to consider a Motion to limit the time which Scottish Members may spend on the Housing (Scotland) Bill in Committee? Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, as a result of the examination of the Bill by the Committee, local authorities in all parts of Scotland, and associations of local authorities, are making renewed representations against the Bill? Is that why the Secretary of State for Scotland has prevailed upon the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House to limit discussions?

Mr. Macleod: No, Sir, of course not. Although, naturally, the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) is better informed on matters of opinion expressed in Scotland than I can be, I, too, have seen expressions of opinion about the progress on the Bill in Committee which would not wholeheartedly agree with those of the hon. Member.

Dame Irene Ward: In view of the Prime Minister's statement about retired officers' pensions and widows' pensions being matters for Parliament, may I ask my right hon. Friend whether I shall be able to raise the subject in next week's debate on the Army Estimates?

Mr. G. Brown: No; the hon. Lady will be guillotined.

Mr. Macleod: It is proposed, in accordance with what has become the usual practice over recent years, to suspend the rule for two hours on Thursday, and this will apply to the other Service Estimates in due course. I am sure that my hon. Friend knows that what matters can be raised is for the Chair to decide.

Mr. Grimond: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, in making a plea for more progress in the Scottish Standing Committee, made a promise, or threat, that he has many more interesting Bills which he wants to bring before that Committee? Can we be informed on Wednesday what these Bills are, so that we may know our fate?

Mr. Macleod: I have not seen, but I will study, that observation by my hon. Friend.

Sir A. V. Harvey: Has my right hon. Friend seen a Motion on the Order Paper in my name and the names of nearly 40 hon. Members on both sides of the House dealing with the plight of widows of members of the Armed Forces? If he is not able to arrange a day for a debate, will my right hon. Friend "have a go" at the Chancellor of the Exchequer? Is he aware that some of these ladies, some of them very old, are living on National Assistance and that it is time something was done about it?

[That this House, recognising the hardship suffered by retired officers, pensioned other ranks and widows of the armed services, especially those who are old, whose retired pay and pensions cannot be debated under Pensions (Increase) Bills and bear no relation to current awards, urges Her Majesty's Government immediately to improve the pensions of widows bereaved before 4th November, 1958, and to examine the conditions peculiar to all armed service pensioners, and, as soon as economic circumstances permit, to introduce special provisions to improve their retired pay and pensions.]

Mr. Macleod: There is, of course, a link between that Motion and the Motion standing in the name of the hon. Member for Southampton, lichen (Dr. King) on public service pensioners, because it has been the practice that when increases are awarded to Service pensioners, at the same time legislation makes improvements for other public services.

[That this House, recognising the hardships of public service pensioners and especially of older public service pensioners, whose pensions bear no relation to similar pensions now obtaining in the public service, urges Her Majesty's Government to introduce, as soon as economic circumstances permit, a new Pensions (Increase) Bill to raise the incomes of such pensioners.]

I cannot give an undertaking that time will be provided to discuss this matter, but I will discuss the Motion not only with my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but with other Ministers as well.

Mr. Strauss: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Transport Bill contains a great deal of contentious and


complicated matters, which will have great consequences for the nation and all those who work in the transport industry, and that discussion of these matters, therefore, should not be curtailed or prevented? Is he further aware that progress would have been greater if the Minister of Transport had accepted at least a few of our Amendments? May I ask whether the guillotine Motion will contain a direction to the Minister of Transport to attend the Committee at least on some occasions?

Mr. Macleod: I cannot accept the strictures applied to my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport, and I cannot see why the arguments which the right hon. Member for Vauxhall (Mr. Strauss) put forward against an Allocation of Time Motion on the Transport Bill were not equally valid against the Transport Bill, which was larger and more complex, which was introduced by the Socialist Government.

Mr. W. Yates: In view of what occurred on Tuesday last, may I ask my right hon. Friend, first, whether he will give time in due course to debate the Motion in my name on the procedure on Private Notice Questions?

[That this House considers that any honourable Member, having obtained leave of Mr. Speaker by 12 noon should have the right to convert one question down for oral answer on the Order Paper into one of Private Notice, provided that by so doing he does not anticipate the question of any other honourable Member already on the Order Paper, and that any rule to the contrary should be laid aside.]

Secondly, may I draw my right hon. Friend's attention to the Motion on the Order Paper on Central Africa and ask that in view of Sir Roy Welensky's statements in this country, he should bear in mind that many of us have friends and relatives in Southern Rhodesia and that we are not altogether happy about some of these extraordinary statements? Should we not have a debate on the Federation before further action is taken by the Government?

Mr. Macleod: I have noted the Motion on Private Notice Questions, but I cannot believe that the House would welcome the enormous extension of time,

which, of course, would come out of the ordinary day, that would be involved in the widening of the rules about Private Notice Questions.
As for Northern Rhodesia and the Federation, I replied yesterday that we could discuss this matter in the ordinary way. There will be Orders in Council, although they are not the ordinary Orders which need an affirmative Resolution of the House, and I should have thought, in view of the plea which came from both sides of the House yesterday, to reflect on the proposals and move forward to the elections, that there was something to be said for not having an immediate discussion on this matter.

Mr. Gaitskell: Nevertheless, would the right hon. Gentleman not agree that, although these Orders in Council are not subject to either the negative or affirmative Resolution procedure, it is most desirable that we should have a full day's debate on the Northern Rhodesia constitutional proposals? Although I am not asking for one in the very immediate future, will the right hon. Gentleman give an undertaking that there will be such a debate before Easter?

Mr. Macleod: The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition is right that the Orders are made under the Prerogative and do not require affirmative or negative Resolutions. As for a debate and the timing of it, what I said yesterday stands. We will discuss that through the usual channels.

Mr. S. Silverman: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether he has had any discussions since last week with the usual channels, or any unusual channels, about finding a suitable occasion on which the House could consider the recent conduct of the Attorney-General? Has the right hon. Gentleman's attention been drawn to the Answers which the Attorney-General has given, which disclose a situation the absurdity of which is almost equal to its injustice?

Mr. Macleod: I have, of course, noted the Questions which have been put on the Order Paper. This matter was exhaustively dealt with by the Home Secretary and myself at the time of the business statement, and I have nothing to add.

Mr. M. Stewart: On the Housing (Scotland) Bill, may I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he recollects that we had a comparable English Bill last Session and that although we gave the Bill the protracted discussion which it deserved, a guillotine Motion was not considered necessary and there was no idea of introducing it at this comparable stage in Committee? Is the introduction of the Guillotine an example of discrimination against Scotland, or does it mean that the Secretary of State for Scotland is more inept at handling proceedings in Committe than are his English colleagues?

Mr. Macleod: Neither.

Mr. Ross: I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will reconsider that answer, because we have never yet seen the Secretary of State for Scotland at this Committee. As it is only a week since the Committee was persuaded that it should sit on Tuesday afternoons in order to have more time in which to give the Bill the searching examination it merits, how can the right hon. Gentleman justify this change of attitude?
Can the right hon. Gentleman also tell us how the business will be conducted next Wednesday? Will there be two separate debates? At what stage will that absentee landlord, the Secretary of State for Scotland, read his brief?

Mr. Macleod: I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland will take part in Wednesday's debate. As far as the form of the debate is concerned, it has become—I do not like to use the term "standard practice", for that is the last thing one would want to see—

Mr. G. Brown: It has under this Government.

Mr. Macleod: The right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) knows the precedents well, as I do. The normal procedure is that when there is a double Allocation of Time Motion the debate covers both Bills.

Sir C. Osborne: Can my right hon Friend offer any hope of finding time to discuss the pay pause before the Chancellor's Budget statement, in view of the extraordinary support given to it by today's announcement that the staff of

Transport House have been refused the increase they demanded because the Labour Party says that it cannot afford it? Since that attitude is the basis of the Chancellor's policy, could we not discuss it now with the Labour Party's help?

Mr. Callaghan: Before the Leader of the House replies to the hon. Member for Louth (Sir C. Osborne), will he also take into account that, if the offer that the Government care to make to the railwaymen and other public servants is as good as the offer made in other directions, there will not be much complaint from public servants?

Mr. Speaker: Order. I think that we are getting rather far from next week's business.

Mr. C. Pannell: Can the Leader of the House say what is delaying the setting up of the joint Committee of the Lords and Commons to consider the renunciation of peerages? Has the right hon. Gentleman run into difficulty on his side of the House? Or is the delay because of second thoughts that Lord Hailsham may really consider that he sees the road back?

Mr. Macleod: No, Sir. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman has used a form of shorthand. The considerations of the joint Committee will go a good deal wider than the problems of renunciation, big as they are. I said last week that I would hope that, in two or three weeks' time, we will have an opportunity of discussing this and that I would then hope to move to set up a Select Committee.

Mr. Oram: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether the Nevada nuclear tests will have taken place before the debate on the Defence White Paper?

Mr. Emrys Hughes: As several days are to be devoted to the Army, Navy and Air Force Estimates, can the Leader of the House say when are we to have a debate on the protection of the civil population? Is he aware that we have not had a civil defence debate for many years, and that there is exceedingly great interest in the country in the Government's proposal to disperse part of the civil population without knowing where they are to be dispersed to?

Mr. Macleod: Yes, Sir. This is the time of the year when we debate defence and the different Service Estimates. Civil defence, being part of defence itself, is bound to come, if hon. Members so wish, into the two-day defence debate next week.

Mr. Warbey: Would the right hon. Gentleman tell us why the Pipe-lines Bill is being taken first in another place? The Bill raises the whole issue of private or public ownership in public utilities. In view of its constitutional importance, why is it not being taken here first?

Mr. Macleod: It is going through another place first purely because of the time factor. At this time of the year, as I have mentioned already in another connection, it is convenient for the Bill to start its course in another place. All the matters mentioned by the hon. Gentleman will be in order on Second Reading and other stages in this House.

Mr. Fernyhough: Does not the right hon. Gentleman think that he is becoming too guillotine-minded? There is a growing practice of limiting back benchers' debating time. On Thursday, for instance, we shall discuss Army Estimates totalling£524 million. Before the Government get that Supply, all hon. Members who want to take part in the debate should have the opportunity to do so. If there is to be an extension of only two hours, they may not be able to do so.

Mr. Macleod: The extension of two hours for these debates on the Estimates has become almost standard practice for many years past—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."] For a considerable time, anyway, and it has been found generally convenient for Vote A debates.

Mr. Manuel: Has the right hon. Gentleman any idea of the intensely contentious nature of the Housing (Scotland) Bill? Is he aware that it is intended to filch power from the Scottish local authorities? Does he think that it is right, or serving the cause of democracy, to apply a guillotine which will not allow us to scrutinise the Bill as we should?

Mr. Speaker: Order. In the interest of the House in general I think that we will have to leave the merits of that kind of proposal to the occasion when the Motion is offered to the House.

Mr. Manuel: On a point of order,
Mr. Speaker. Do I take it you are dressing me down in some way? I asked a question about the Guillotine and how it would apply to the Housing (Scotland) Bill. I was perfectly justified in doing so. I have heard such questions asked dozens of times.

Mr. Speaker: I was not seeking to reprove the hon. Gentleman. I was thinking that we had already had a number of questions about the advisability or appropriateness of applying the Guillotine to these two Bills and I thought that perhaps now it had reached the stage when the House might think it better to leave the arguments on the merits, as it were, to the occasion when we debate the Motion. I meant nothing more than that. I spoke in the interest of the time of the House.

Mr. Callaghan: Is the Leader of the House considering making a statement next week on the serious statement made by Mr. Kenneth Kaunda, in which he alleges that Sir Roy Welensky has a plan to arrest the Governor of Northern Rhodesia? In view of the statements made by Sir Roy Welensky since he arrived in London, does not the right hon. Gentleman think that this matter should be inquired into and cleared up, and a very early statement made to the House, in fairness to Mr. Kaunda, to Sir Roy Welensky, and to everybody else concerned?

Mr. Macleod: I have seen a good deal of comment in the last day or two, but I have not seen the statement to which the hon. Gentleman refers. But he has now drawn it to my attention and I, in turn, will draw it to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Colonial Secretary.

Mr. Grey: Has the right hon. Gentleman seen the Motion, standing in my name and the names of some of my hon. Friends, suggesting that Question Time should be extended by half an hour? In view of the fact that hon. Members find great difficulty in getting their Questions answered orally, will the right hon. Gentleman find time to debate that Motion?

[That this House, bearing in mind the increased number of questions to Ministers, and the lack of opportunity for


them to be answered orally, is of the opinion that it should meet thirty minutes earlier, thus giving one and a half hours' question time.]

Mr. Macleod: I would like to consider that and find out whether there is a general view in the House about it. One of the difficulties about meeting half an hour earlier is that Standing Committees go on until one o'clock, or a little afterwards, as do many other meetings. This would leave very little time to meet the request contained in the Motion.

Mr. T. Fraser: Will the right hon Gentleman confirm that the Gas Council's Gas (Underground Storage) (Chilcomb) Bill, 1961, has been withdrawn under very great pressure from back benchers opposite? As many hon. Members on both sides of the House would like to discuss this proposition of the Gas Council—a nationalised industry—to bring the country into step with many other countries, will he afford us an opportunity for an early debate?

Mr. Macleod: It may well be that that would be appropriate on a day devoted to debate on a nationalised industry. The Gas Council is issuing a statement this afternoon about the withdrawal of the Bill, and my right hon. Friend the Minister of Power is given a Written Answer about it in the House today. When the Bill was first brought forward there was—indeed, there still is—a prima facie case, as the hon. Gentleman knows, on economic grounds for the Measure, but the matter is a great deal more complicated, perhaps, than was thought then.

Mr. Rankin: Does the right hon. Gentleman remember that some weeks ago I asked him who was responsible for the Toothill Report and he replied that the Government were considering that Report? Is he aware that since then the Minister of Labour and the Parliamentary Secretary for Science have referred to its recommendations, but that the Secretary of State for Scotland has kept quiet all the time? Can the right hon. Gentleman tell me which Minister will assume responsibility for this Report and answer at the Dispatch Box in the event of my being lucky in securing an Adjournment debate on the subject next week?

Mr. Macleod: Subject to correction, I would have thought that the reply to that Adjournment debate would probably come from the Scottish Office. But, as the hon. Member knows—and this, of course, is the whole merit of the Toothill Report—many Ministeries are concerned, so it is not easy to pigeon-hole responsibility. Nor should it be done so far as Scotland is concerned in these matters.

Mr. Rankin: In view of that reply, instead of consigning it to an Adjournment debate, can we have a day to deal with this Report?

Mr. Macleod: The hon. Member has secured his Adjournment debate—

Mr. Rankin: Not yet.

Mr. Macleod: Then perhaps he is reinforcing his case, in which case he is doing it very efficiently. I dare say that that will be the first airing of the matter.

Sir B. Janner: Can the Leader of the House say whether he has forgotten that there is an Albemarle Report? Is it not time that we debated it? Why have we not debated it so far?

Mr. Macleod: Of course I have not forgotten the Albemarle Report. The Departments concerned have been working very hard on this matter. But, as I told the hon. Member before, I cannot see a prospect of an early debate on it.

Mr. M. Foot: Would the Leader of the House again carefully consider the request of my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) and some others for a discussion on the operation of the Official Secrets Act? Is he aware that there is very widespread concern about the matter?

Mr. Speaker: The present information, which may be inaccurate, is that an appeal is now lodged in that case. On the whole, I think that it would perhaps be better that we should not now proceed to discuss it.

Mr. Foot: On that point of order. Newspapers, including the Daily Telegraph this morning, have contained widespread comment about the gross misuse of the Official Secrets Act which arises not only from this particular case,


but from a series of cases. Therefore, I would have thought that I was in order in asking the Leader of the House whether he would consider the question of a debate about the operation of the Official Secrets Act, not merely concerning the case in which there is an appeal, but the whole operation of the Act.
I would have thought that that was a perfectly proper request. I hope that the Leader of the House will take it very seriously, whether or not he has received a request from the official Opposition Front Bench, because there are many people who think that it is a shocking state of affairs that such an Act should be used in such a fashion.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. M. Foot) is quite in order in asking to have a debate on that topic, but he is not in order in commenting in the process on the merits of the procedures adopted in that case. That is my view, in view of the appeal now started.

Mr. Foot: All I was saying, Sir—and I would have thought, with great respect, that it was in order—was that there was widespread comment about the operation of the Official Secrets Act. Of course, it arises from a recent application of it, but I was trying to urge on the right hon. Gentleman that even though the Opposition Front Bench might not have thought it advisable, for some reason or other, to press for a debate on the matter, it was open to the rest of us to press for a debate on the general grounds, not only in this case, but in the interests of the State, as questions are being raised in newspapers all over the country which suggest that the Attorney-General has wrongly used his powers. Will the right hon. Gentleman consider it?

Mr. Speaker: This is a quite mistaken use of the business question. The hon. Member is perfectly entitled to ask for a debate, but he need not do all that.

Mr. S. Silverman: On a point of order. May I draw your attention, Mr. Speaker, to what may have been overlooked, namely, that three times this week, in answer to Questions, the Attorney-General assured the House that the prosecution in the case which you have in mind was not a prosecution under the Official Secrets Act? Therefore, my hon.

Friend's pressure for a debate about the Official Secrets Act could have no bearing whatever on the case now proceeding in the Court of Appeal.

Mr. Speaker: I do not accept that statement. My recollection of the substance of the matter was that this was a charge of conspiracy to commit offences, those offences being offences under the Official Secrets Act. That is why I regard the matter as involving our rule.

Mr. Macleod: I appreciate that the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. M. Foot) is going wider than the issue of a particular case My information, Mr. Speaker, is the same as yours, although I have not been able to confirm it. On the wider issue, I will, of course, take account of representations made by all hon. Members for time for a debate. But at this stage I do not want—indeed, I would not think it right—to go beyond what has already been said by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and myself

Mr. C. Pannell: On a point of order. With great respect, Mr. Speaker, are you correct in what you have said about there being an appeal? Speaking from memory, it is my impression than an appeal has not been lodged. It had not been lodged last night.

Mr. Speaker: I can do no more than act on the information which I have, and which I received at about 2.15, which was that five out of the six persons involved had instituted appeal proceedings. I hope that I am not wrongly informed, but that is my belief.

Mrs. Hart: Further to that point of order. Is there not a difficulty here in that my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) during this week has received Written Answers from the Attorney-General clearly indicating that the prosecution, although involving incitement to commit offences which would have come under the Official Secrets Act if they had been committed, nevertheless did not involve the Official Secrets Act? In view of that, how can the matter be sub judice while an appeal is being considered?

Mr. Speaker: I thought that I dealt with that point and indicated that in my view it was undesirable to discuss the merits now.

Mr. Thorpe: May I press the Leader of the House further on the question of the hon. Member for Leeds, West (Mr. C.) about the Motion on House of Lords reform? Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there are many hon. Members who are most anxious to give him time to debate the Motion which stands in his own name, and that while we recognise that he has been very self-effacing in suppressing his own interests in this matter, in view of the generous facilities which we would like to afford him, can he assure us that the matter really will be debated during the next two or three weeks and that there will not be any undue delay?

Mr. Macleod: Yes, Sir. "Two or three weeks" is an elastic term, but I meant what I said. Let us try to make it. One can never be certain, because all sorts of things can happen to upset the business of the House, but I am reasonably confident that we can debate the matter within two or three weeks. It is certainly my intention that we should.

Mr. S. Silverman: Will the right hon. Gentleman be kind enough to clarify an answer he gave a little time ago to my hon. Friend the Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes) about the time for a debate on civil defence? Are we to infer from his answer that no special day for debating it is in contemplation because of the opportunity that there might be to discuss it in the general debate on defence?
Will the Leader of the House bear in mind that it is now several weeks since he expressed a contrary opinion in answer to a question by me? He then thought that a special day for civil defence would be desirable in view of the length of time and the changing circumstances since the last one. Will he bear in mind that while we have a general debate on defence, we also have separate debates on the Army, on the Navy, and on the Air Force, and that being so, would not it be appropriate to have one on civil defence, too?

Mr. Macleod: I should like to look up the precise words of my answer to the hon. Gentleman. He has given a somewhat free paraphrase of it. As regards the first part of his question, which was fairly put, that is my view of the position.

Mr. Ross: Has the Leader of the House seen the Motion in the name of the Secretary of State for Scotland, who proposes, on the Order for Second Reading of Licensing (Scotland) Bill [Lords] being read, to move, "That the Bill be referred to the Scottish Grand Committee"? Can the right hon. Gentleman say when this will come up, and whether this is in any way related to the Guillotine on housing? As one Tory back bencher said, we want to get rid of housing to talk about public houses in Scotland.

Mr. Macleod: The answer is "No" to both parts of the question. I cannot tell the hon. Gentleman when it will go to the Scottish Grand Committee, and it is not related to the guillotine Motion.

COMMONWEALTH SETTLEMENT BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

4.12 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations (Mr. Duncan Sandys): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
I am afraid that we are starting rather late in the afternoon owing to the lengthy proceedings on the business statement. As only limited time has been allotted to this debate, and as there are a number of hon. Members who wish to speak, I will try to keep my remarks as brief as possible.
The purpose of this Bill is to enable us to carry on the policy initiated in the Empire Settlement Act, 1922, and subsequently reaffirmed by the Acts of 1937, 1952 and 1957. It gives Her Majesty's Government, for another five years, financial authority to contribute to schemes designed to encourage emigration from this country to other parts of the Commonwealth. Some of these schemes were launched by the Governments of the receiving countries, while others were initiated by voluntary organisations here in Britain or overseas.
It is our belief, and a belief which, I think, is shared by most hon. Members, that a steady flow of British emigrants to other countries of the Commonwealth is of benefit to all concerned, and is a source of strength and unity to the Commonwealth. This feeling is shared by the Governments of the principal receiving countries, who continue to look to Britain to provide a substantial proportion of their new settlers.
Incidentally, talking about settlers, the other day I met an Australian who had come here for the first time. I asked him how he liked this country, and he said, "I think that it is a wonderful country, but with this weather I cannot imagine how you can attract your settlers".
From time to time it has been suggested that the British Government should spend more money and give more positive encouragement to prospective emigrants. But I think it will be generally accepted that the mere expenditure of money does not by itself constitute

a migration policy. Nor is it the business of the Government here to exercise pressure to persuade people to leave Britain and settle overseas.
Under modern conditions, a successful migration policy requires the willing cooperation of the three partners—the receiving country, the sending country, and the settler himself. It is for the receiving country to decide the rate and pattern of immigration which meets its needs, and which its economy can sustain, and it is its business to regulate its intake accordingly. We have, I am afraid, to accept that the conditions of present day life have largely destroyed the spirit of adventure which animated the pioneer settlers of the nineteenth century. An immigrant now expects to be assured in advance of a reasonable prospect of employment, good housing accommodation, and social services for himself and his family. This involves considerable capital expenditure by the country to which he goes.
The major initiative in immigration lies therefore with the receiving country and with the emigrant himself, who has to weigh up the advantages and disadvantages of seeking a new life overseas. Our rôle, as the Government of the sending country is an important, but ancillary, one. It is the rôle of assistance and collaboration, and it is important that these considerations should be clearly understood in any discussion of the part we play in Commonwealth migration.
It is against that background that I should like to refer briefly to the progress made over the last five years. It is estimated that between 1957 and 1961 about 750,000 people left our shores to settle permanently, or to work for extended periods, overseas. Over three-quarters of these went to Commonwealth countries. About half of them were wage-earners, and the other half dependants.
This is, I think, an appropriate moment to review very briefly what we are doing to assist this movement of population. First, we contribute a small part of the cost of the assisted passage scheme run by the Australian Government, under which any approved settler can travel to Australia for a fare of£10, or free altogether if he is under the age of 19. About three-quarters of the annual flow from this country to Australia, that is,


about 33,000 people, travel under this scheme.
As the House knows, there has been general praise for the efficiency with which the Australian authorities have carried out this scheme. It involves intricate and complicated arrangements for the selection of people in this country, for their transport to Australia, and their resettlement when they arrive there. There will always be—and this is inevitable—a small proportion of migrants who find that they are not, after all, suited to their new surroundings, but the great majority of them settle down smoothly and happily in their new homes.
In addition, the British Government give financial assistance to eight voluntary societies in Britain who arrange for the migration and training of children. We contribute£4 towards an outfit for each child, and 10s. a week towards his maintenance. This maintenance allowance will shortly be increased to£1 a week. Some of the societies are also helping whole families to emigrate. I am sure that the House will on this occasion—we debate this matter only about every five years—join with me in paying tribute to the valuable assistance which these voluntary organisations have given over the years to overseas settlement.
Our contributions to the assisted passage schemes and to the child migration arrangements are, of course, made under the Commonwealth and Empire Settlement Acts, the operation of which the Bill proposes to extend for a further five years. Apart from this, we also contribute towards the administrative expenses of two other voluntary organisations.
One of these is the Big Brother Movement, which has done splendid work in helping youths of 15 to 19 to settle in Australia, and which acts as their guardian until they reach the age of 21. The other organisation is the Women's Migration and Oversea Appointments Society, which provides up-to-date information and objective advice on employment prospects and living conditions in Commonwealth countries. In addition, the Ministry of Labour, through its employment services, carries stocks of publicity

material and provides a channel for the distribution of information and application forms issued by the migration authorities of other Commonwealth countries.
As the House knows, we have over the last five years not spent anything approaching the figure of£1½million a year which has been authorised under past Acts and which we are maintaining in this Bill. This has in part been due to the need for economy in Government expenditure, but also to the fact that some Commonwealth countries have preferred to operate their own immigration programmes by themselves without assistance from us.
The introduction of this Bill reaffirms the importance which Her Majesty's Government attach to migration from Britain to other parts of the Commonwealth and is evidence of our desire to assist this movement in a practical way. The steady flow of British migrants undoubtedly makes a significant contribution to the development of the economic resources of the Commonwealth. But what in my view is equally important, it helps continuously to strengthen the ties and refresh the contacts which hold together the members of our Commonwealth family. For these reasons, I am sure that all are agreed that the British Government should continue to co-operate with other Commonwealth Governments in the promotion of migration.
I hope, therefore, that the House will give the Bill a Second Reading.

4.23 p.m.

Mr. G. M. Thomson: As the Secretary of State has said, this is an important Bill, but modest in its financial implications. Although it is a modest Bill, it raises quite big issues with regard to this country's migration policies. As the Secretary of State said, it is only every four or five years that the House has much opportunity to discuss this, and I hope that I shall be excused if I say something about the background issues against which the Bill must be seen. Whether this Act, which was born in very different circumstances away back in 1922, should be continued depends on the view we take about the Government's migration policies as a whole.
This is the second Bill dealing with population movements to and from this country that has been before the House of Commons in the last few months. First, there was the Commonwealth Immigrants Bill, and now there is the Commonwealth Settlement Bill. It is an astonishing fact that both these Bills were put before the House and commended to us by the Government without the Government having any full knowledge of the kind of facts that we ought to have to be able to make our judgment upon them. Fateful decisions were taken, particularly with regard to the Commonwealth Immigrants Bill, on the roundest of round figures and the crudest of guesses on the actual numerical flow and, more particularly, of how it was composed in terms of different occupations.
This Bill is supported by the recommendation of the Oversea Migration Board, of which I have the honour to be one of the newer members, and the Board is painfully conscious of the fact that the provisions of the Bill will be carried on for a further five years on quite inadequate information. For seven years the Oversea Migration Board has been advising successive Secretaries of State that this country needs proper migration statistics. The law of this country is still in the steamship age and has not caught up with the fact that substantial numbers of immigrants both ways now travel by aeroplane.
As far back as 1958, the Board put its point of view in what I regard as a masterpiece of Whitehall understatement. It said:
We are asked to recognise that any estimates of migration must contain a fairly wide margin of error having regard particularly to the exiguous statistics which are available and to the fact that net migration is a difference between two large gross movements each with a substantial margin of error.
How the Government can be expected to make sound judgments about migration on kind of basis, I simply do not begin to understand.
The Oversea Migration Board has, in Report after Report, been saying, in a note of weary desperation, that the laws of this country should be brought up to date in this respect. In the latest Report, which recommends the continuance of this Bill, it stated:

We hope that it will not be for much longer that the United Kingdom will remain the only major country of both emigration and immigration which cannot produce complete and adequate statistics of its own two-way migration movements.
The fundamental premise on which the Bill is based is the recommendation of the Oversea Migration Board, repeated year after year, that this country should go on encouraging migration to the Commonwealth countries overseas, provided that the composition of those migrating does not change substantially in terms of the different occupations that make it up. That is the basis of this Bill, but no one knows with any certainty whether this recommendation is, in fact, being fulfilled.
No one knows exactly what is the composition of the various occupations of the people who leave this country and go to settle overseas, because so many, particularly people of the highest skills and of the professions, so important for the receiving countries and such a loss to us, travel by air, and people who travel by air are not obliged to fill in the form stating why they are emigrating.
The situation is equally ludicrous in terms of inward movements. There are no figures for people coming into this country or leaving it who go by way of Ireland or the Continent. These short sea route or short air route passengers are simply not recorded. Vast numbers of West Indian immigrants, whom we have been discussing recently, come precisely in this way, and are unrecorded in the migration statistics.
I sometimes think that one of the great myths about this country is that it conducts its public affairs on an empirical basis. It is often said that we are not dogmatic, but take an empirical attitude, and find out the facts and face them. It is simply not true. Too often the people who go out to discover the facts are regarded as a lot of longhaired Fabians or, perhaps, Bow Groupers. We take many of our public decisions with a sublime indifference to statistical research.
It seems unbelievable—I can hardly believe it yet—that the Government could have altered one of the fundamental concepts of our Commonwealth relationship—the principle of free entry—without first obtaining much fuller and


more adequate facts than the House has been given. It is only a Conservative Government, with their suspicion of statistics and belief that filling in a form is an un-English activity, that could be so incompetent as to ask the House of Commons to take these great decisions without knowing exactly where they stand.
I should have thought that it would be common ground on both sides of the House that a knowledge of population movements in and out of the country was a basic piece of knowledge for a Government to possess in modern society. I do not accept the difficulties which the airline companies have put up against obtaining this information voluntarily. All that the Oversea Migration Board proposed was the filling in of a form, which it estimated would take exactly ninety seconds to complete. The airline companies have said that this would create chaos and great inconvenience to everybody, but every time we fly from London to Paris we have to fill in such a form. I cannot believe that it would cause very much difficulty. I can only conclude that the Government have not been firm enough about this.
In the Oversea Migration Board the Secretary of State has a valuable group of men and women. I exclude the Parliamentarians on tooth sides from my compliments, but the Board comprises a group of distinguished and busy men and women. I find it difficult to believe that they will go on giving the right hon. Gentleman advice if they are forced to operate in the kind of statistical twilight in which they have had to work for so long a time. I hope that the Joint Under-Secretary of State will be able to give us an undertaking that the Government will introduce legislation to provide the minimum statistics necessary to enable us to make proper judgments about these matters.
I hope that the Government will also consider extending the Board's terms of reference. It has found itself in great difficulty in trying to give advice to the Secretary of State on outward migration without being able to take into account the substantial inward-moving population. It would be valuable to the Secretary of State to have all-round advice of the general pattern of migration movements, both ways.
As a member of the Board I should like to pay tribute to its staff, and especially to the various secretaries that it has had. They have given remarkable service. There is a great romantic literature about migration movements from Britain to the Commonwealth, but there are precious few facts about them. It has fallen to the successive secretaries of the Board to provide the main body of knowledge on the subject, and they have done so without ever being allowed to go out to the receiving countries in order to study the problems in the field—so mean-minded are we.
Now that the Commonwealth Immigrants Bill has passed from the House, the Government ought to consider strengthening the Board's terms of reference so as to enable it to operate with independence and authority in giving advice on this vital field of public policy.
This raises the question of the Board's chairmanship. It has been the practice for one of the Under-Secretaries of State for Commonwealth Relations to be chairman. Our present chairman has been an excellent one, and the point that I am raising now is in no way concerned with him; it is a point of principle. In fact, my only objection to the present charman is that he has completely upset all my prejudices about the Prime Minister's relatives in the Government. But he has the rather invidious job of wearing two hats. He is the chairman of a Board which gives advice to the Secretary of State, but he is also one of the Secretary of State's own deputies. No man can successfully give advice to himself. I should have thought that there was a case for altering the arrangements and for having an independent chairman.
The Bill, which the Board has recommended, deals only with the movement of migrants to a small part of the Commonwealth—containing about 31 million people out of a population of 600 million. It deals mainly with the movement from this country to what we might now call "the old Commonwealth". Some hon. Members, especially on this side of the House, are, naturally, preoccupied with the potentialities and problems of the new Commonwealth, and are sometimes inclined to forget just what a remarkable world phenomenon is the old Commonwealth. It consists of countries which are very widely


scattered, geographically, but which have been populated over two centuries mainly by people from this country and, to a large extent, from my own part of the United Kingdom.
Perhaps I will be excused if I take this opportunity of reminding the Government and the House that the West Indies is not the only country which has an emigration problem. Scotland still loses 25,000 people a year, and still contributes more than her fair share towards the outward migration of people from Britain. Some migration from Scotland in the past—as in the case of other parts of the United Kingdom—was unassisted and unplanned, and very often very unpleasant. Today, there are many more Scots in the Commonwealth than in Scotland. I sometimes think that somebody ought to enunciate a kind of "McGregor's Law", which would prove that the Scottishness of a Scotsman varies in inverse proportion to his distance from Scotland.
The trouble about Scotland is that it loses more than its fair share of Scots without receiving in return by any means its fair share of immigrants from the Commonwealth. All the Australians, New Zealanders and Canadians with Scots grandmothers may have the most romantic desire to see the little village where their forebears were born, but they end up by preferring to stay in London during their period of emigration to this country. I cannot understand why, but that is the fact.
The outstanding feature about Commonwealth emigration is that it does not depend upon the amount of money spent by the British Government. It is a movement whose motives go deeper than financial help or Government encouragement. But the Government have had the duty of deciding whether they should go on encouraging migration, or should discourage it. It is true that the financial outlays are very small, but the capital investment involved in maintaining emigration to the Commonwealth is very considerable, because the sort of young people who, with their wives and families, go abroad, take with them their skills and all the capital investment which has been put into their education. We must face that fact.
However, I agree with the Secretary of State that it is worth while continuing to make the sacrifices involved in ensuring that people of the kind required by the Commonwealth continue to go off and settle there. It is true that, since the war, a substantial part of immigration into Australia, New Zealand and Canada—and especially Australia and Canada—has come from continental Europe. We should not regret this, indeed, in some of the problems that the Secretary of State will shortly face in his Common Market discussions he may be glad that there is a substantial body of continental Europeans in Commonwealth countries, because they may be able to assist in creating a favourable public opinion on the mainland of Europe. The relatives of those European settlers may well be in favour of concessions being made on behalf of the Commonwealth in any association we may have with the Common Market.
But it is still very important to maintain the flow of British migrants to the countries of the Commonwealth. We have to bear in mind, as some of the Reports of the Oversea Migration Board have made clear in a fascinating way, that although, in Canada, only 20 per cent. of the immigrants come from the United Kingdom the proportion of teachers, doctors and engineers and professional people who may be expected to have a very considerable influence on the life of their new country is very much higher than 20 per cent.
We also have to face the fact, as the Oversea Migration Board has said in its recommendation this year, that if we are to go on encouraging people with skills to go to Commonwealth countries we have to back that up with a massive educational effort in this country. We are ourselves desperately short of many of these skills. If we are to go on giving this help we need a much bigger expenditure on higher education in all its forms in this country than the Government have so far felt able to engage in. I hope that the Government will take due note of that part of the recommendation of the Board.
I come to details of the Bill. The sum of money given for assisted Australian passages is, of course, purely a token sum. Other Commonwealth countries


have said that they do not want financial help in this way, but I am sure that the spending of this modest sum is justified if it will allow Australians to feel that they have a stake in this project and that we are all concerned in cooperating with them.
I should like to hear from the Government whether the provisions of the Bill would allow money to be expended in a wider variety of ways. I am thinking particularly of the proposals put forward from time to time about giving some housing help to emigrants going from this country. The Dutch and the Italians have done this. It would be worth exploring whether it is practicable for this country to do it.
I wish to pay tribute to the work of the voluntary societies, particularly in their work with children. When a child is left in this country with no family, for one reason or another, there is much to be said for giving that child a start in a new country where he can have help. I understand that the record of these societies is very good in that matter.
It is necessary in bringing in a Bill for a further five years to look at the bodies which receive this money and to make sure that they are adapting their policies to the changing nature of the Commonwealth. The Secretary of State mentioned the Women's Migration and Overseas Appointments Society, which receives a substantial share of the grants which go to voluntary bodies. Only a month or two ago that society was called the Society for the Overseas Settlement of British Women, a rather magnificently Victorian title. It says much for the society that it has not only changed its title, but also brought its operations much more into line with the needs of the contemporary Commonwealth. The last time I met the secretary of the society was on the airport in Enugu, in Eastern Nigeria, where she was helping in making teaching appointments from this country to Nigeria. This is the kind of think which should be commended.
There are changes constantly taking place in regard to the countries which have been traditionally receiving countries for the migration involved in this Bill. One of the five receiving countries was the Union of South Africa, but

South Africa is no longer a member of the Commonwealth. I should like to hear from the Government what has happened about the official co-operation that Her Majesty's Government have offered to Commonwealth Governments to attract emigrants. I think of the kind of services the Ministry of Labour and other Government Departments give. Now that South Africa is no longer a member of the Commonwealth, those facilities should no longer be offered here.
Another receiving country is the Federation of Central Africa. There are no schemes of assistance for migration there at the moment, but I hope that no expenditure will be undertaken under the Bill in respect of Central Africa until the political future of that country is properly settled. At present, the Government are in some difficulties arising from having attracted settlers to Kenya in the past in perfectly good faith. In the present political situation they are facing a problem of very great embarrassment. We should not encourage further European emigration to Central Africa until we know that there is to be a stable political future for that area.
This brings me to another point. It seems that during the lifetime of the Bill it might well be that the full£1½million authorised might need to be used. I put this proposal to the Government for consideration. They might consider using some of the money under the Act to make it possible for some of the European settlers in areas of Africa for which we are responsible to migrate to other countries of the Commonwealth. The Act might be used to help to ease a very difficult problem in regard to European settlement in various African territories.
Above all, I emphasise that the Bill should be seen against the whole background of the problem of the migration policies of this country. The original Empire Settlement Act was based on the old concept of Imperial emigration by exporting the unemployed working class from this country, where there was normally a substantial pool of unemployed, to fill the empty spaces of the Dominions. That concept has now completely and utterly changed. Blessedly, there is no pool of unemployment here,


nor are the receiving countries mainly interested in getting immigrants to fill their open spaces. The present picture is an infinitely more complex one, and one on which we need much more precise information.
Today, there is a two-way traffic of emigration between this country and the old Commonwealth. It is not only a case of emigration from here to Australia, New Zealand and Canada, but at least half as many migrants come here for varying periods from the other countries of the Commonwealth. There is equally a two-way traffic between Britain and the new Commonwealth. We are expected to send out to the newer members of the Commonwealth doctors, teachers and other specialists to help them in their acute problems of development and, at the same time, many of their people come here to fill jobs in our hospitals and public services and to do many other essential tasks in our country.
The new countries of the Commonwealth, the emerging countries, need teachers, doctors and engineers even more urgently than countries such as Australia, Canada and New Zealand who are seeking them so much from us. If Canada, Australia and New Zealand want these groups of settlers from this country, we are entitled to encourage them, but there is the other side of the obligation. It is that the older Commonwealth countries should share in the task of providing technical assistance to the new emerging countries of the Commonwealth. At present, Canada, Australia and New Zealand do a certain amount of this, but it is not nearly enough. Technical assistance to the new emergent countries of the Commonwealth ought to be a joint Commonwealth responsibility.
We on this side of the House accept the Bill, but it is justified only if the Government accept the need for obtaining more accurate information about the two-way flow of migration in this country and if they also accept the need for seeking support from the older members of the Commonwealth for a joint effort to give help to the newer members of the Commonwealth in providing the scarce skills which they so desperately need.

4.50 p.m.

Mr. Brian Harrison: I will detain the House for only a few minutes, but there are one or two points that I wanted to make about the Bill. First, I should like wholehearedly to endorse the remarks my right hon. Friend made about the child migration societies, and particularly the Big Brother movement, which is the only context in which I like to see the term "big brother" used. I have had experience of working with migrants. I have served in the Army with boys who had grown up to men after going out under the Big Brother movement, and under the Fairbridge movement, and I have the greatest respect for the type of person which has gone out under these assisted schemes.
The tragedy today is that, owing to certain views on the bringing up of children in local authority homes, and the dislike of children's officers of getting rid or losing control of any of the children under their care—though, I am sure, with the very best motives—these two organisations, and particularly the Fair-bridge organisation, are now finding the greatest difficulty in getting enough children to go out to Australia and other countries of the Commonwealth. I hope that something can be done to encourage a little more relaxation of the strict rules of the children's officers in the counties, in order to give youngsters the wonderful opportunities that are now open to them, either through the Fair-bridge Society or the Big Brother movement.
The second point is that everybody wants economy in general and expenditure in particular, and I claim to be no exception, but I wonder whether we are right, in a Bill like this, in having a maximum figure of£1½million and then spending only about£160,000. It makes the Bill look rather silly when we spend only a fraction of the money which Parliament has approved as a suitable amount to be used for Commonwealth settlement. I wonder whether we might be able to do a little bit more, positively to encourage settlers.
When one sees the magnificent schemes that the Dutch Government are operating to help to settle Dutch migrants in Australia, and the way in which they are financially assisting them, I think it is rather extraordinary


that a foreign—albeit a very friendly—country should be making greater efforts to move its people into one of our Dominions than we are making ourselves.
These two comments I have made on the Bill in no way lessen my regard for the work that has been done, and has been made possible by the contributions, under this piece of legislation, and consequently I wholeheartedly support it.

4.54 p.m.

Mr. Peter Walker: I should like to support what my hon. Friends have said in praise of the voluntary societies, and the need to do something more imaginative in the way of assisting migration from this country to the Commonwealth.
One of the disadvantages of the present system is that the decision by a man as to the Commonwealth country to which he is to migrate often depends on whether or not the country is advertising in the particular newspaper which he reads. It is a tragedy that, with this great Commonwealth theme, we cannot do something on a more collective basis to put before people in this country the opportunities which exist throughout the Commonwealth.
Surely at a time when the Commonwealth is going in for a period of dynamic economic expansion, both in many parts of the newly developing Commonwealth and in the older countries of the Commonwealth, where there is vast economic expansion, it is a little surprising to discover that our expenditure for assisting migrants to the Commonwealth has steadily declined year by year for the last five years, and that we are spending only about one-tenth of the money which has been provided for this purpose.
I should like the Minister, when replying to the debate, to tell us that the Government's decision to extend the operation of the Bill on the basis of£1½million per annum is related to the fact that they have decided to use more money in the five years that are ahead.
I should also like to ask my right hon. Friend to consider the possibility of creating in London a centre, perhaps a Commonwealth Employment Bureau or

Commonwealth Migration Bureau, where, in one place, anybody interested in seeing what services and skills are required in Commonwealth countries can discover the opportunities for their particular trades and professions, and obtain information about the social and climatic conditions of the country concerned. This centre could, in turn, be responsible for promoting throughout the country an interest in the schools and employment exchanges in the services that could there be provided.
My right hon. Friend mentioned the fact that the Minister of Labour has certain material provided for it by the various High Commissioners' offices, but this is a somewhat negative approach to the problem. It would be much better if an organisation were there to obtain and prepare such material, and see that it was made available throughout the country.
There is a tendency, when considering the subject of migration, to think in terms that, because we have a great shortage in this country of people with various skills, we therefore do not want them to go abroad. I have always considered that to be a very short-sighted policy, because the more we encourage those people with particular skills to go to me Commonwealth, so we shall promote an increase in the industrial and trading activities in those countries. Obviously, that would be to the long-term benefit of our own country.
I ask my right hon. Friend to consider the possibility of providing funds under the Bill to help countries like India, Nigeria and Ghana to prepare information about their future demands for skilled labour. Probably, a lot of careful research could be carried out which would enable the Commonwealth as a whole to know the requirements and needs of skilled labour in the many emerging nations of the Commonwealth. It is on these lines that I should like to ask my right hon. Friend to think of applying die£1½million per annum we are voting in the Bill.
I welcome the decision to extend the Act for another five years, and I hope that the amount of money made available will be used far more enthusiastically and dramatically than during the last five years.

4.58 p.m.

Mr. Nigel Fisher: I think that all of us in the House are very conscious of the vast opportunities that exist in the Commonwealth and for those of our people who go there—the millions of acres of rich land, only the very beginnings of the tremendous industrial expansion which will take place and the infinite resources of water and power and minerals, which are only partially exploited at the present time.
I take it that the object of migration to the Commonwealth and the object of this Bill is to develop these resources and to seize these opportunities. When one remembers that what, only 200 years ago, was a little group of quite unimportant colonies in North America has now become the leading nation of the free world, one realises the great potentialities of Canada, Australia and other Commonwealth countries in 1962.
The only thing needed to convert that potentiality into reality is people—men and women—who are the very best exports that we can possibly send, from the point of view of the receiving countries. I should have thought that we could have done rather more than we do, since we have such large numbers in a small area, as compared with their small numbers in large areas, and that, while we should be able to spare a few more people they equally would be able and ready to take any number we could send.
Yet emigration today is at its lowest post-war level. No one advocates mass migration, which would be economically disastrous for us and indigestible to the receiving countries. Everybody recognises that this is an individual choice and that the Government cannot send people; the individual has to take a personal decision to go All the Government can do is to help and to encourage those who have already taken that decision. The question is, are we doing enough to help and to encourage them?
I think that this Bill is, in a way, a sham. We are paying lip-service to a migration policy but we are spectators rather than active protagonists of it. The Financial Memorandum to the Bill explains that by the renewal of the Act we shall empower the Government to contribute£1½million a year to promote migration, yet, as other hon. Members

have stressed, on average over the last five years we have actually spent only precisely one-ninth of that sum, and each year since 1957 we have been spending less and less.
Of the average expenditure of£169,000 a year—if my mathematics are correct—£150,000 goes on the assisted passage scheme to Australia, and I agree with the hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. G. M. Thomson) that that is merely a token of good will to the Australian Government. It is quite right that we should give this token. I support it. But it does not of itself add a single migrant to the total. These people would go in any case, paid for by the Australian Government, and we are merely helping the Australian Government. Only£19,000 a year, therefore, out of a total of£1½million is being used to assist individual migration.
Yet many people need help very much indeed. People have to wait sometimes for years in Government hostels in Australia because of the housing shortage there. In Australia there are very few houses to let, and houses to buy are very expensive compared with prices in Britain. I support what the hon. Member for Dundee, East said: we could greatly help some of our British migrants to Australia if we made housing loans in the way in which the Dutch and Italian Governments help their nationals in our Commonwealth. We have never thought of doing such a thing. The Dutch and Italian loans are matched£ or£ by the Australian banks and in course of time are repayable. They therefore become over a period a revolving credit.
I quite understand why we do not want to do this. I take it that the reasons are mainly political. It is thought—maybe rightly—that while we have a housing shortage in this country the British taxpayer might resent having to subsidise housing for migrants in Australia. I can understand the point. The Australian Government are in equal difficulties because, if they give special assistance to the housing of immigrants in Australia, they will have to obtain the money from native Australians, which is a little unfair on them.
But we missed a great opportunity when we passed the Building Societies Act two years ago. Leading building


societies in this country were quite ready to extend their operations by making a small contribution from their funds towards Commonwealth housing. In effect, under that Act the Government would not allow them to do so. Great efforts were made by many of us at the time, including my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Sir C. Black), who is very knowledgeable on this matter, to persuade the Treasury to consent, but my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary—I do not like having to say this—was adamantly unhelpful on that occasion, and the opportunity was missed.
The great need of these Commonwealth countries is for more trained, skilled, professional and technical manpower. We know that that is true of the United Kingdom, too, and of the receiving countries in the Commonwealth, but it is even more true of the less-developed countries of the Commonwealth. That is one of the main points which was emphasised in the Seventh Report of the Oversea Migration Board, of which I am a member.
We all know that the need for capital in the world is very great but we sometimes forget that the need for the men to put that capital to work is just as great. It is an important contribution which we, although no longer so rich in money as we were, could still make in manpower to our developing Commonwealth.
During Questions this afternoon I urged my right hon. Friend the Minister of Education that he should make a sustained and imaginative drive, in cooperation with the Secretary for Technical Co-operation, to try to meet this increasing demand. The Government are doing a great deal but we cannot be satisfied with what is being done.
It may be said that these things are easy to ask for but difficult to supply; but there is one thing to which the hon. Member for Dundee, East drew attention which it would be quite easy to supply—the statistics of the volume and pattern of overseas migration which the Oversea Migration Board lacks and which it therefore has not available to help it make a sensible diagnosis and to give sensible advice to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. We are

precluded by the attitude of the air lines from collecting the necessary figures efficiently or completely. We have the co-operation of the shipping companies, who help us by asking passengers to fill in appropriate forms, but the air lines will not help us and so the information is not obtained. I believe that no less than 46 per cent. of all United Kingdom immigration to Canada today is by air, yet we have no statistics of it and no records except such as those we can get from the Canadian Government. It is not very efficient.
Attempts have been made to persuade the air lines to supply us with these figures. I am advised that it would be quite a simple form, with ten questions, taking about 1½minutes to complete. I do not think that would be such an onerous burden upon travellers. The Oversea Migration Board, as has been said, includes some high-level people like Sir Roy Harrod and Sir Colin Anderson, who are being asked to give a certain amount of their time to this problem, and it is almost derogatory to them to tell them that they cannot have the figures for which they have asked in seven consecutive Reports. As long ago as 1957 Lord Alport, then Under-Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations, acknowledged in the House that we very much needed this information. That was five years ago. He said that he had no doubt that the Government would find means of getting the information without introducing any unnecessary inconvenience to travellers or any unnecessary red tape; and yet five years later my right hon. Friend the Minister of Aviation told me in an Answer to a Parliamentary Question only this week that he had no powers to get this information for us.
In my view, the Government should take the powers. I do not know why they are not taking them in the Bill. As they do not want to do so, I hope that they will introduce another Bill. It will take up more Government time, when the provision could quite easily have been slipped into this Bill. I hope that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State, as this has been pressed from both sides of the House, will give us the benefit of his advice on this point when he comes to reply.
This may be a small matter but it seems to me that our failure to obtain


the information on which to base migration policy is symptomatic of the Government's indifference to the policy which they pretend to support. I do not think that they are really trying. Their attitude seems to be one of benevolent neutrality on the whole issue. It should be much more positive. I am sincere when I say that we should try to work for the development and cohesion of the Commonwealth. We can do so in a much more positive way through the medium of this Bill. Although I support the Bill, I urge the Government to make much greater use of it in future than they have done in the past five years.

5.10 p.m.

Dr. Alan Thompson: I want to add a few words in support of my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, East (Mr. G. M. Thomson). I want to concentrate on one aspect, namely, graduates and students involved in this migration. The whole academic interchange between the Commonwealth and ourselves is a two-way process, as it should be. For instance, the number of Commonwealth and foreign students attending courses in this country has risen from about 10,000 in 1950 to about 47,000 in 1960. It is a proud boast of this country—I certainly feel very proud about it—that the proportion of overseas students to our population is the highest of any country in the world. Students not only benefit from our courses: they become very important strategically. When they return home they become doctors, civil servants, cabinet ministers, etc.
Therefore, this is one of the most vital aspects of British policy, not only in the sphere of education, but in the spreading of British influence and ideas and democracy throughout the world. Of the total of 47,000 overseas students, about 30,000 were from the Commonwealth. This is a great achievement. We should go on increasing the number, but it is already something of which we can be proud.
The reverse process of sending students abroad is equally important. When I was a full-time university teacher, students would come and say to me, "We want to go on. We have taken our degree in Scotland. The 'done'

thing is to go to Oxford or Cambridge", I tried to dissuade them, not because I have anything except the highest regard for Oxford and Cambridge, but because I thought that, having gone through their undergraduate training and become professionally qualified, they should widen their horizons. Unless they had very special reasons for going to Oxford and Cambridge, unless the departments to which they wanted to go were extraordinarily good, my advice was that they should be more imaginative and cross the ocean to Canada or other Commonwealth countries. What little influence I had was directed to this end.
The establishment of these academic links is very important It has been overlooked to a certain extent. We have exchanges at the level of professors and the higher grades of university teaching. However, emigration of students is at a lower academic level. This aspect should be examined with a view to the exchange being increased.
I strongly support the views of the hon. Member for Surbiton (Mr. Fisher) on technical education. I hope that there will be the most vigorous pursuance of the British Government's commitment, which they accepted at the New Delhi Conference. I gather that we are to have a White Paper on that soon. I hope that it will be very specific. At the New Delhi Conference the British Government accepted a commitment to pursue wholeheartedly the expansion of technical education within the Commonwealth.
May I develop further the question of the two-way process of academic interchange. There is much to be said for the establishment at our universities and other places of regional centres of learning. This is where a department takes under its wing a whole region. Studies of history, language, economics, etc., are conducted in relation to that region. The establishment of these regional centres will help us in the aim of expansion of Commonwealth education for which we are striving under the Bill. The University of Edinburgh is at the moment considering setting up a centre of African studies, which could be an admirable training ground for people who will go out to African territories and use their professional skills there.
We must accept the changed needs and the changed objective of emigration. One hundred years ago we sent our best people out to farm, to settle, to build up the basic agricultural and economic wealth of overseas countries, not only of the Commonwealth, but also of the United States of America. Nobody can take a car journey from the east coast of America across to California without being impressed by the courage and resourcefulness of our ancestors who crossed those rivers, climbed those mountains and settled that great country many years ago. The same applies to many of our territories.
The days of settling are almost over in some of our overseas territories, but not in all of them. We have passed from the entrepreneureal stage to the supply of professional skills and enterprise, which is just as valuable. We must accept that some of our previous colonial territories do not want any more white settlers. I know that that term has become an abusive one, but I mean it in its strict economic sense. Instead, they want people with professional skills, especially with technical skills. We may applaud or deplore this tendency, but it is there.
I appeal to the Secretary of State to think very much in terms of the emigration of academic, professional and technical skill, which can bring together the great pattern, the great mosaic, of Commonwealth education.

5.16 p.m.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations (Mr. Bernard Braine): We have had a short but very useful debate. Some interesting suggestions have been made and searching questions have been asked. I will do my best to answer them. The hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. G. M. Thomson) referred to the terms of reference of the Oversea Migration Board. As the House will recall the Board was set up in 1953
to consider and advise the Secretary of State upon specific proposals for schemes of emigration from the United Kingdom to other Commonwealth countries and upon any matter relating thereto which might be referred to it by him.
A number of schemes were already in existence when the Board was set up. These ware the assisted passage scheme

and the schemes of child migration to Australia. No other proposals have subsequently been put to the British Government for participation in joint schemes of emigration under the terms of the Acts. Other principal countries operate their own schemes of passage assistance, but have preferred to do so from then-own resources.
While the Board, in consequence of this, has not examined any new schemes, it has made a continuously constructive and helpful contribution to our thinking on the problems of migration. Indeed, I should like to take this opportunity to pay a warm tribute to the Board, which is presided over by my noble Friend and which is able to draw upon the wisdom, experience and enthusiasm of my hon. Friends the Members for Surbiton (Mr. Fisher) and Bury St. Edmunds (Mr. Aitken) and the hon. Member for Dundee, East. I join, too, with the hon. Member for Dundee, East in expressing thanks to the Board's officials. They and the members of the Board have done and are doing a most useful job.
The hon. Member suggested that the Board's terms of reference should be amended to include the subject of immigration. This goes far wide of the Bill, but I will certainly look into the matter with my colleagues. We are conscious of the mutual relevance of immigration and emigration, but the problems which arise in connection with immigration into this country are very different from those concerning emigration to the Commonwealth. I undertake, however, that we shall look at the hon. Gentleman's suggestion when we take a fresh look at the Board's terms of reference. May I say how much I appreciated the graceful reference to my colleague, the Board's chairman.
I will deal straight away with one small point raised by the hon. Member for Dundee, East. The Republic of South Africa no longer comes within the scope of the Commonwealth Settlement Acts.

Mr. G. M. Thomson: The arrangements with the Republic of South Africa, as with the Commonwealth countries, are administrative arrangements that do not come within the terms of the Empire or Commonwealth settlement Measures. I asked whether the Government would cease those administrative arrangements.

Mr. Braine: South Africa is now a foreign country, and will be treated like any other foreign country. If any information is required which the Ministry of Labour, for example, is able to give to other foreign countries, I have no doubt that it will be given, to South Africa. But South Africa is clearly outside the scope of this Bill, since she is no longer a Commonwealth country.
The hon. Gentleman and also my hon. Friend the Member for Surbiton spoke of the inadequacy of migration statistics. In the past it was true that we were able to form a fairly comprehensive picture of migration from our own statistics and those of Commonwealth countries, but these has been a significant shift in recent years from sea travel to air travel. As the last Report of the Board made plain, it is believed that about a quarter of the British migrants in 1960 travelled by air.
Moreover, it is clear from our statistics of movements by the long sea routes that the great majority of breadwinners who migrate from the United Kingdom are skilled people in categories that we can ill spare at home. We know how many of those people go by sea, but I agree that since no detailed information is available, at this end at any rate, about passengers on the air routes there is a certain gap in information about those going by air.
My right hon. Friend is anxious that that gap should be closed, but to do so will require legislation. As has been already pointed out, there has been some resistance by hon. Members to the idea that a system similar to that operating on the long sea routes should be extended to the long air routes. We have no wish to impose unnecessary regulations upon the travelling public. Accordingly, we decided to see whether adequate migration statistics might be obtained by other means.
I am able to tell the House that sampling is being tried experimentally, and some of the results should be available in the near future. Sampling, by its very nature, is somewhat limited in the results it can achieve, but it might provide useful information in a broad sense about the occupational categories of those going oversea by air. I suggest that we should first look at the results of this sampling—which, as I say, should

be available fairly soon—and see what can be achieved. If sampling does not provide the answer, the Government will re-examine the problem.
I would join with my hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr. B. Harrison) in praising the work of the voluntary societies. It is, of course, a matter of concern to us that we might lose an undue proportion of our skilled manpower. That raises the whole question of how far the Government should go out of their way to encourage migration from this country. My hon. Friend the Member for Surbiton said that the Government had adopted an attitude of benevolent neutrality, but I do not think that that is fair.
Clearly, it is a British interest that countries like Canada, Australia and New Zealand should continue to look to this country primarily for their immigrants. Looking back over the last century, we can see that the movement of Britons to those countries has not been a matter of there being fewer here and more there, cancelling each other out, but an enormous aggregate increase in the strength of the Commonwealth as a whole, in the strength of the British race and the extension of its influence in the world. That movement must surely continue.
Nevertheless, the pattern of the world's needs is changing all the time, and no good is done to the cause of Commonwealth migration by ignoring that fact. If we are to survive as a nation, let alone provide our Commonwealth partners with the resources they need for their own development, our economy here must be strong. If too large a proportion of our young people and of our skilled and professional folk leave our shores, our ability to maintain a high rate of economic growth and to continue as the heartland of the Commonwealth system is diminished.
The Oversea Migration Board has drawn attention to the problem. In past Reports, it has recommended that Britain
…should continue to encourage migration to other parts of the Commonwealth, provided that there is no radical change in the composition of those migrating according to age, sex and occupation or in the economic position of the country.
In its latest Report, however, the Board states that this policy is still basically


right, but that the proviso about the economy of this country calls for comment.
It says:
There is concern at the effect of the present shortages of certain categories of skilled and professional manpower on the development of our economy, even when allowance is made for gains by immigration.
The Board accordingly recommended that the attention of Government bodies concerned with the future planning of higher education and industrial training in this country should be drawn to the needs of the Commonwealth as a whole, and of developing countries in particular, with a view to increasing our ability to meet the need overseas and at home.
I am glad to say that this is being considered now by the Ministries of Education and Labour, by the Office of the Minister for Science, by the Department for Technical Co-operation, and by the Robbins Committee on Higher Education. Nevertheless, the manpower position will have to be watched, particularly as regards the few professional and skilled categories that are of vital importance to our own economic growth. It is quite clear that the loss of a few highly-skilled scientists and technicians in those categories could have a disproportionately adverse effect on our economy.
The hon. Member for Dunfermline Burghs (Dr. A. Thompson) reminded us, however, that we should keep this matter in perspective, because our losses of highly-trained manpower are, to some extent, offset by immigration. In 1960, for example, 2,188 teachers migrated from this country by the long sea routes, but 2,068 came into Britain, and in respect of teachers, doctors and trained nurses—the occupations in which the movement was greatest both ways—the net losses were much lower in that year than in 1959, although among professional engineers and scientists they were a little higher.
In one respect our losses of skilled manpower may be more apparent than real. That arises from the accepted classification of a migrant as a person going abroad for one year or more. Many of our professional and skilled people are going out under contract for periods of two or more years and, in the main,

they go to the developing countries where their skill and know-how make a valuable contribution to progress in various fields. We must encourage that, but those people are not lost to us; they will come back.
I was asked why the Government did not suggest further schemes under the Acts. I thought that my right hon. Friend made it plain that the primary intiatives in securing new settlers must lie with the receiving countries, who alone can determine the rate and the type of emigrant that they can sustain. For our part, we are always willing to collaborate in any practical way with Commonwealth Governments but, as I have explained, our economy depends on an expanding labour force here, and, whilst we are happy to contribute to Commonwealth development through a steady and representative flow of citizens from this country, our manpower situation would prevent our proposing any special schemes ourselves to accelerate that movement.
The hon. Member for Dundee, East asked whether the resources under the Bill could be used to facilitate the migration of British settlers from one part of Africa to another. The answer is "No—that would need other legislation."
My hon. Friend the Member for Maldon asked why my right hon. Friend had authority to spend up to£1½million on schemes for the promotion of emigration when, in fact, we spent only a tiny proportion of that amount. Since the war we have spent, on average, less than£½million a year. It may be asked: why then retain the figure of£1½million? We feel that in so unpredictable a field as migration we should maintain some flexibility in regard to expenditure; for example, in 1950,£910,000 was spent. We think, too, that the figure of£1½million gives an assurance to Commonwealth Governments of our continuing interest in migration and provides us with the means of accommodating any new schemes which they may wish to introduce. Commonwealth Governments are aware that we are always ready to discuss new schemes with them.
It was suggested—and my hon. Friend the Member for Surbiton supported this idea—that we should assist


our own migrants in Australia by helping them with housing. I am advised that expenditure on housing schemes would not come within the scope of the Commonwealth Settlement Acts. In any event, we do not consider that the Dutch and Italian schemes for assisting their migrants to Australia and in respect of housing provide a precedent for a British housing scheme. Their schemes spring from the necessity to encourage migration in order to relieve the shortage of land and of jobs at home. The comparatively small number of migrants involved allows the money to be made available from Government sources, when matched by contributions by the Australians, to be of real practical help.
Frankly, however, a substantial sum of money would be necessary to provide housing finance for British migrants. If a scheme comparable to those operated by the Dutch and Italian Governments were introduced and the cost shared with the Australian Government—and assuming that an average house would cost about£3,000 and that about one in six of the migrants who went out were assisted by this means—the total cost would run, at the current rate of flow, to about£4 million a year.
The Government have examined the possibility of British building societies participating in migrant housing schemes. But these societies face certain difficulties. We must remember that they have evolved on a mutual basis by taking investments from small investors to whom they have an obligation to repay. Public confidence in building societies depends on the proper supervision of their activities, of the loans to borrowers and the necessary mortgage repayments. The societies are precluded from making loans overseas because this would involve them in risks which they would not otherwise have regarding their business with persons in this country.
We must also bear two other points in mind. Further investment overseas of this order would be bound to aggravate Britain's balance of payments position. If financial help for housing migrants were provided from Government sources, it would have to be at the expense of other projects overseas, and I particularly have in mind Government aid to the poorer developing countries. This is obviously a matter

of priorities, and I think that there will be general agreement that of the amount we can afford to spend abroad, priority should be given to schemes which are essential to Commonwealth countries at an earlier and more crucial stage of their development.
Anyway, emigration is a highly personal matter. There is a limit to what Governments can do. My brother and his family emigrated to Australia some years ago when he had already passed the age of 40. For him and his wife this was an intensely personal decision taken over long months, if not years, of weighing up the balance of advantage. I recall long discussions that I had with him. He was not influenced by Government policy—or the lack of it—or by the exhortations of politicians, or even by a desire to open up the empty spaces of the Commonwealth. What weighed with him was whether, taking everything into account—job prospects, housing, schooling for his children—he and his family would secure a better and a more promising life in Australia than if they stayed here. Up to the moment of decision he was in doubt, and circumstances arose soon after his departure which, if they had occurred earlier, might have caused him to change his mind.
Housing is only one of the factors which must be taken into account by emigrants when making up their minds whether or not they should leave this country. The provision of new housing in Australia is, it would be fair to say, on as generous a basis as it is here, having regard to the relative size of our populations. I do not think that one could envisage asking the taxpayers of this country to provide resources for housing in some other part of the world when new housing here is considered—and rightly so—to be a high social priority.
My hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Mr. Walker) raised the interesting question of machinery for encouraging migration. It has never been suggested to us by any of the Commonwealth countries seeking British migrants that they want us to set up some special co-ordinating machinery or that we should set about boosting emigration ourselves. Our relationship here is one which is concerned with countries that, in this context, are competing with one


another for British migrants, and it follows that they would prefer to deal with us on a bilateral basis.
This also needs to be said: it would be wrong for us to set up machinery to take over a task which is properly that of the High Commissioners' offices here—the task of interviewing and selecting would-be immigrants, and of advising them of the facilities they can expect and the opportunities that await them overseas. Having said all this, I think it should be realised that we have not done so badly for the Commonwealth in this matter. From 1946 to 1960, 1,381,000 British people emigrated to Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Rhodesia alone. That represents about one-third of the total number of migrants absorbed by those countries from all sources.
Since the war the British taxpayer has contributed more than£7½million to assist migrants to the Commonwealth. The indirect cost incurred in terms of investment—for the education and training of these migrants—is even vaster. My right hon. Friend said in his speech that it is our firm belief that migration strengthens the ties of interest and sentiment which still happily bind our family of nations together. That is so. Equally, I have no doubt that within our free society emigration will continue to fluctuate in volume and change in character. That is only to be expected, because for the individual to uproot himself from one country and start afresh in another is an entirely personal matter and one that will be influenced by a great variety of circumstances over which Governments may have little control. Even so this Bill is a practical expression of the Government's desire that emigration to the Commonwealth shall continue and that worth while schemes to encourage this shall be supported. If I judge it correctly, that has been the sense of the speeches made during this debate.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Standing Committee pursuant to Standing Order No. 38 (Committal of Bills).

COMMONWEALTH SETTLEMENT AGREEMENT [MONEY]

[Queen's Recommendation signified.]

Considered in Committee under Standing Order No. 84 (Money Committees).

[Sir WILLIAM ANSTRUTHER-GRAY in the Chair]

Resolved,
That, for the purposes of any Act of this Session to extend the period for which the Secretary of State may make contributions under schemes agreed under section one of the Empire Settlement Act, 1922, it is expedient to authorise any increase attributable to the said Act of this Session in the sums payable out of moneys provided by Parliament under the said Act of 1922.—[Mr. Braine.]

Resolution to be reported.

Report to be received Tomorrow.

EDUCATION (Recommitted) BILL

Considered in Committee [Progress, 21st February].

[Sir WILLIAM ANSTRUTHER-GRAY in the Chair]

Clause 6.—(AMENDMENT OF S. 70 OF SCOTTISH ACT OF 1946.)

5.40 p.m.

Miss Margaret Herbison: I beg to move, in page 7, line 3, to leave out "attending courses of education" and to insert:
in respect of their attendance at universities, colleges of education, colleges of technology and other institutions in Great Britain and Northern Ireland".
Before I deal with the Amendment, Sir William, I should like to ask you to convey my thanks and those of Scottish Members to Mr. Speaker for giving us the chance at this stage to discuss these matters, which we consider to be of importance in Scotland. I should like to say to the Under-Secretary of State that Scottish Members still feel strongly that because of the radical change that is made in the Bill it ought not to have been tied up with a Measure concerning England, in whose case the change is much less radical, and should have been discussed in the Scottish Standing Committee, where we could have given much more attention to it.
Section 43 of the Education (Scotland) Act, 1946, provided for grants for all persons in need of them. It covered pupils over school-leaving age and students at universities and advanced colleges of various types. Clause 5 of the Bill covers the first category, those who are still pupils at school, and some others. Clause 6 covers the second category and it refers to Section 70 of the Scottish Act of 1946. When we turn to Section 70, we find that it deals with the application of the Education (Scotland) Fund. It is only that which gives anybody any clue as to the meaning of this Clause. Indeed, a number of hon. Members, and not only on this side, could not find out where the radical change was being made.
If we were to leave the words "attending courses of education" in the Clause, there would be no indication of what is meant by "courses of education". We do not intend to press our Amendment to a Division. It is a probing Amendment, on which, we hope, the answer from the Under-Secretary will tell, not only Members of Parliament, but all those who are interested in education—for example, parents who might want to know the possibilities of grants for their children—exactly what the term "courses of education" covers. The Amendment is more specific. I realise—it was my intention to have changed it—that it is more limiting than the existing grant policy. The Under-Secretary of State does not need to explain to us that the words "Great Britain and Northern Ireland" would have a limiting effect.
5.45 p.m.
I should like to know how many grants are given annually for students in this category who are studying overseas. Who are the people who will be covered by the Clause? Which people will be considered as attending courses of education? My hon. Friends who were interested in the part of the Bill which applies to England and Wales had many Amendments in Committee. Last week, they had many Amendments in an effort to bring more and more types of student into the category of recipients of the Anderson type of grant.
We simply do not know from the Clause what type of student is covered by what will be understood as the

Anderson type of grant. I take it that this will apply to university students, but will it apply to those who are taking first degrees only, or will the Scottish Education Department have power to give grants to other students Who take further degrees?
The Under-Secretary will know that for a considerable time Scottish Members have shown concern at the fewness of those students who are doing research work in Scotland. We know that that is not altogether the fault of the Secretary of State or the Scottish Education Department. We realise that our universities could be doing much more. We know also that for scientific and technological research, grants can be obtained by students from the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. Some of us at least know, also, that the Department of Education in Scotland may make grants for research in the arts.
We would like to know how many of those grants are given by the Department each year. The qualification "attending courses of education" in the Clause is important. Some students who are doing research will not be attending courses of education. We want to know what help they will get for their research work, which is considered to be of such importance. In particular, we want to know about the scientific and technical research because of the great needs industrially for this in Scotland.
Is the Under-Secretary convinced that in both of those directions the grants are sufficient in number? Does he know whether anybody who is fit to carry out research in either direction—scientific and technological or the arts—is denied the opportunity in Scotland for financial reasons? If anybody is denied that opportunity for financial reasons, will the Clause provide the financial wherewithal to cover the research work, which we consider to be important?
I take it that those who are attending colleges of education will be covered under the Clause. I hope that the Under-Secretary will inform us of any other students who are covered. In other words, we want to know whether every student in Scotland outwith our schools and the equivalent of our schools will be covered by the very loose wording of the Clause.
Students of architecture are often advised to apprentice themselves to a firm and to do their technical study in evening classes and possibly day-release classes. We have found in the past that very often those students are financially worse off than the full-time students. I know that the Government answer often is that they should be paid more, but there is not a very strong trade union among these young students. Will they have any chance under these provisions to obtain financial assistance from the Secretary of State? As I said, this is merely a probing Amendment and I hope that the Under-Secretary will be able to answer these questions.

Mr. William Hannan: I should like to make a short but rather technical point and I hope that the Under-Secretary and the Committee will bear with me when I try to put forward intentions which, perhaps, are not contained in the Clause. My hon. Friend the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) has rightly referred to the fact that Clause 6 is based on Section 70 (10) of the Education (Scotland) Act, 1946. But that Section has been amended already and, contrary to what my hon. Friend said, the amended Section does not allude only to bursaries and other allowances to enable persons to enjoy courses.
As amended, it reads:
to making payments of sums by way of scholarships, bursaries, and other allowances for the purpose of enabling persons, and to maintain any persons dependent on them "—
These are the important words—
while so doing, to take advantage, without hardship to themselves or their parents of any educational facilities available to them…
Therefore, it would now read:
to making payments of sums by way of scholarships, bursaries and other allowances to persons attending courses of education.
What does this mean?
Am I right or wrong in thinking that persons dependent upon such students will not now receive any allowances in order to allow the students to continue their studies? I should be glad if the Under-Secretary could reassure us on this point. As my hon. Friend the Member for Lanarkshire, North has said, the Amendment is designed—perhaps not in the best words—to elicit from the

Government what courses and what people are covered and to whom, particularly in research work and in study for doctorates, these facilities will be made available.

Dr. Alan Thompson: I should like to take up one point which was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison). My hon. Friend referred to architects and I should like to widen the scope slightly to include various arts and crafts studies and to ask for an assurance that these will receive fairly generous treatment in the matter of grants not only at the undergraduate level—although, strictly speaking, we are dealing largely with diplomas rather than degrees—but at the post-graduate level, in which there is great scope in architecture, town planning and art. I should like an assurance that grants for courses of education cover wide ranges of studies in architecture and art.
This is an aspect of our education which does not always receive the attention it deserves, partly perhaps because of our preoccupation with university and school education. But graduates in schools of art and architecture become absorbed into a whole range of extremely important professions, as architects, planners, teachers, and artists and craftsmen, and their work is concerned not only with our economic well-being, which is vitally important, but with the enrichment of our culture and the improvement of our whole physical environment.
One of the problems is to persuade enough people taking courses of art and architecture to go on and teach it to others. At the Edinburgh College of Art, out of 22 people who took diplomas in the school of design and crafts in 1960 only nine went on to teach the subject. The rest were attracted to industry. I could give other figures, which represent the same trend, of only a small proportion going on to teach.
Those who go on to teach would receive fairly generous treatment from the Department I know that it is the policy of the Secretary of State to encourage these people, but I should like an assurance that those who want to go on to do post-graduate work, particularly


in the school of architecture, will receive favourable treatment from the Department. The sphere of town and country planning and the whole methodology of the subject is widening so much already and is becoming such a vital part of our whole academic and educational activity that I should like to see a generous policy pursued by the Department to give money for research in architecture and town planning and indeed for some of the more specific design and craft studies.
I should be glad to have the comments of the Under-Secretary of State on the subject.

Mr. Malcolm MacPherson: I should like to put a question to the Under-Secretary about another branch of training which the phrase "attending courses of education" literally would exclude. This is the course of training which an intending advocate takes after he has taken his arts and law degrees. He then must submit to a year of pupilage and this is as much training for his profession as is his law course and is a good deal more specific training for his profession than is the arts degree
This is the kind of situation in which it is extremely difficult for young men of financially modest backgrounds to make their way. The degrees, plus the pupilage, put a young man of the working class at a considerable disadvantage and this is the kind of situation in which the phrase "attending courses of education" should be interpreted in an extremely wide fashion. A year of specific professional training ought to qualify for grant in the same way as theological, medical or any other kind of professional training.
I hope that the Under-Secretary will be able to say that it will.

6.0 p.m.

Miss Harvie Anderson: I had not intended to intervene because, as the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) said in Committee previously, it is generally accepted that there were reasons why it was not necessary for me to do so. I do so on this occasion, however, for rather different reasons. The reason for my silence in the Committee previously was that we in Scotland are well content

with Clause 6 because, as those who have administered bursaries on education committees for many years are aware, we are more generously treated in Scotland than perhaps some hon. Members opposite realise.
This is a happy situation and we want it to continue. But the width of interpretation accepted in the past is one of which we are extremely jealous and which, as the hon. Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) has said, should be continued. It is extremely satisfactory to know that various institutions, which do not normally get the recognition which some of us would like to see, such as the National Institution of Houseworkers, qualify in this way.
With the good record of the past in the allocation of bursaries in Scotland, and the width of view which has been taken, those of us who have studied Clause 6 should pay tribute to the remarkable administrative work which has been done so successfully by those behind the scenes. Those who know the work involved in bursary awards, the detailed knowledge which is required and the examination which is entailed, must be amazed that such a very small staff, dedicated to this task and to the service of those who have made applications, could have carried out their duties in Scotland in such a remarkably successful way in this venture. I conclude this short intervention, therefore, with a note of gratitude to those who have done this job so well.

Mr. Ede: I hesitate to intervene in a debate on a Scottish Clause, but I regret to say that my hon. Friend the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) has introduced words which limit the students to places of education in Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Miss Herbison: I do not think that my right hon. Friend was here—

Mr. Ede: Yes, I was.

Miss Herbison: —when I said quite clearly that that was a mistake and asked the Under-Secretary of State not to take up the time of the Committee in dealing with it.

Mr. Ede: Of course, my hon. Friend may be able to exercise her blandishments on the Under-Secretary of State. I assure her that I intervene with great hesitation and with all due humility, because I know that no Englishman is ever allowed to say anything about Scottish education unless he intends to pour on it unadulterated praise—which I do not feel.
I believe that education is an international republic and that to circumscribe the opportunity of participating in it by any geographical limit is a mistake. I regret that students will not be able, at any rate under this Clause, to go to Trinity College, Dublin, to Harvard, or to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which is an institution without parallel in the world and which has very largely solved the problem of providing high technological education in a liberal atmosphere.
I cannot help thinking that we are imposing an undue limitation of opportunity on some of the best students that we have when we make such provisions. A large number of people who held similar views on religion to mine, and who suffered in the past in England for doing so when it came to their going to a university, used to study at Leiden, in Holland. This has built up a tradition of association between this country and Leiden in theology and science which has been of great value to English and Dutch students and to both nations in times gone by.
While I do not want to say any more than this, I regret that we have accepted this limitation for England—perhaps I should say that we were made to accept it for England by a vote of this Committee earlier—and that we are now to impose a limitation on Scotland as well. If there is anything that does a Scotsman good it is the realisation that there are other countries besides Caledonia.

The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. R. Brooman-White): I thank the right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) for giving me the keynote on which to start what I shall endeavour to prevent becoming a diatribe on the merits of Scottish education. Under the Bill, our students will enjoy precisely that breadth of opportunity which he would like to see them enjoy.
The hon. Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) made it clear that she did not wish this to be taken as a limiting Amendment. She asked for figures. There are about 100 students at present receiving grants from the Scottish Education Department for courses outside the United Kingdom.

Dr. A. Thompson: Is it not a fact that a Scottish student attending Trinity College, Dublin, gets a smaller grant than he would if he were at an English university, whereas an English student gets the same grant at Trinity as he would at another university? Is that not discrimination?

Mr. Brooman-White: The point is that English students going to Scottish universities will start at some advantage vis-à-vis Scottish students, but we are waiting the further report of the committee considering maintenance questions. I made a quick inquiry to find out whether we have sent any students to America. We have sent one to McGill University and a number to Trinity College, Dublin, and to courses in langauges at continental universities.

Dr. Horace King: The hon. Gentleman has given a figure of 100 as studying outside the United Kingdom. Does that mean outside Great Britain and Ireland?

Mr. Brooman-White: It includes grants to Trinity College, Dublin, and to continental universities.
The right hon. Member for South Shields spoke of the advantages of universality. One of the things we are getting from the Bill is that the Scottish student, who, hitherto, has been at a disadvantage vis-à-vis the English student in going to universities south of the Border—including a lower level of grant—will now get what he has long campaigned for and felt was his due. This is, equality of treatment in being able to go to the university of his choice. Certain adjustments are awaited on the question of maintenance, and we hope that the committee's report will be forthcoming shortly.
The hon. Member for Lanarkshire, North asked whether all this is logical. The broad definition is that the Scottish Education Department is giving grants to full-time courses at university, to


college education for teaching, and to advanced full-time and sandwich courses at other full-time establishments. This leaves to local authorities part-time further education courses, non-advanced further education courses, and school courses.

Miss Herbison: Would that mean that people taking training as social workers, for instance, would be covered by the Clause?

Mr. Brooman-White: The broad definition which we are using is a course which is an extension of a university course necessary to acquire qualifications to enter a profession. There are bound to be borderline cases of demarcation between what comes under the local education authority and what under the Department. But during the first year of practical experience, this matter has not raised any great difficulty and we hope that it will run even more smoothly as our experience progresses.
Reference has been made to research. Grants are available for 45 research scholarships and about 30 have been given this year to arts students. Other research grants will continue to be assessed on their merits and given through the Agricultural Departments or the D.S.I.R., as hitherto. I must apologise for not having figures about the D.S.I.R. grants, but I do not think that there has been any substantial change from previous practice.
The hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) and other hon. Members referred to the case of the professional student. The hon. Member for Stirling and Falkirk Burghs (Mr. Malcolm MacPherson) will remember that this matter arose in our debates in Standing Committee. The point is that we are not giving grants to part-time students. We feel that if a man is engaged in his professional work, it is up to the profession to assist him and he is eligible for consideration for a grant for part-time study. If he is attending as a student full-time, he is covered, and that deals with what the hon. Member for Dunfermline Burghs (Dr. A. Thompson) said about students of architecture.
The hon. Member for Maryhill spoke about the availability of courses and the

Amendment of paragraph (10) of Section 70 of the 1946 Act. This is a technical matter, but I think that I have followed him correctly. The words about allowances for dependants in the 1946 Act were included to remove doubt arising from the hardship criterion, but now that we have removed the hardship criterion I am assured that the words are no longer necessary. The position is automatically covered.

Mr. Hannan: That is precisely the point. As the Bill stands, there is no reference to dependants and there is simply a reference to grants for the courses. The explanation in Committee left no doubt about the position, but I do not understand at what point in the Bill that doubt is dispelled. If I am assured that the phrase "for educational courses" includes grants for dependants. I shall be satisfied, but until then I do not think that I shall.

Mr. Brooman-White: The question of allowances for dependants is covered in the provisions concerning eligibility for married students and in the assessment of the general income scales. I cannot give the hon. Member a more detailed explanation now, but I would be glad to go into detail with him afterwards, if he likes.
6.15 p.m.
My hon. Friend the Member for Renfrew, East (Miss Harvie Anderson) mentioned the smoothness with which this new method of payment has been put into operation. I would like to thank her, on behalf of the Department, for her words of appreciation and hon. Members of the Committee, in general, for what has been said about this transition.

Mr. Malcolm MacPherson: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether a pupil for the Bar—he is not part-time, but spends his whole time studying for his profession—qualifies for grant?

Mr. Brooman-White: I can go no further than repeat what I said in Standing Committee. Such a student who was not full time would be considered as an apprentice and treated under the arrangements generally made for apprentices.

Miss Herbison: I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 8.—(VARIATION OF GENERAL GRANT (SCOTLAND) ORDER, 1960.)

Miss Herbison: I beg to move, in page 8, line 11, to leave out from "grants" to the end of line 14 and to insert:
by that amount which represents the exchequer contribution".
This is the most important Amendment to the Scottish part of the Bill which we shall discuss today. It has the support of the Scottish Association of County Councils and the Counties of Cities Association. I have received a letter from Mr. Frank Inglis, the Secretary of the Association of County Councils in Scotland, who says:
The amendment which you have put down is in line with the views of the Scottish Local Authority Associations in that the deduction to be made from the General Grant should be the Exchequer element of the appropriate expenditure on 'Anderson' bursaries for 1961–62 and 1962–63.
The hon. Gentleman will be aware from that that every single local authority in Scotland supports the Amendment.
In paragraph 292 of its Report, headed "Consequences of Executive Functions", the Anderson Committee made three alternative suggestions about the operation of the executive functions of award-making. The Minister of Education chose the third and the Secretary of State for Scotland chose the second. The second is:
the central departments might be the award-making bodies, in the sense that they would make the final decisions about making awards to individuals and would pay the grants, but the local authorities would act as their agents in performing some functions which can best be carried out locally.
The final decision on the granting of an award now rests with the Secretary of State for Scotland. It is important to remember this, because of what I propose to say later. Local authority associations in Scotland did not, and still do not, quarrel with this arrangement. Indeed, I believe that the choice which the Secretary of State has made in this instance is better than the choice made by the Minister of Education. The

local authority associations do, however, quarrel with what the Secretary of State has decided must follow from his decision.
I welcomed the fact that local authorities in Scotland were ready to accept the decision of the right hon. Gentleman, which was not made until he had had full and proper consultation with them. Scottish local authorities have a much better record of service in relation to the giving of grants than do some local authorities in England and I pay tribute to them for the work they did over a long period in helping students in Scotland to develop their skills and talents to the full.
The sharp difference of opinion between local authorities in Scotland and the Secretary of State arises from the question of who will foot the bill for these awards. It is the Secretary of State who is to make the final decision about whether an award will be granted. It is usually accepted that the person making the final decision foots the Bill, but the Secretary of State does not accept this.
The objection of local authorities to the decision of the Secretary of State has been known since 29th July, 1960. There have been discussions. There has been a lot of correspondence between the local authority associations and the Department, and the final meeting—or, at least, I take it that it was the final meeting—was held in Edinburgh on Friday of last week. The Secretary of State intends to adhere to his original decision.
Paragraph 290 of the Anderson Committee Report says:
The foregoing financial difficulties"—
these are the financial difficulties which local authorities have been experiencing for a long time, not only over awards, but over the whole question of education—
would, of course, not arise if all grants were paid in future by the Ministry of Education and the Scottish Education Department. The whole cost would then be met by the Exchequer. The whole cost would then be met from the Exchequer. As the local authorities would thus be relieved of about£18 million of expenditure a reduction of the amount of the general grant would no doubt be appropriate.
We accept that, and the local authorities accept that if the Secretary of State


takes over the financial responsibility for these grants, or says that he will take them over, there should be a reduction in the general grant.
In the memorandum to which I have referred the local authority associations say that they have no objection to a reduction in the amount of the general grant. I have no doubt that the Under-Secretary of State has had the memorandum in his possession for some time. It says, in paragraph 4:
The Association, having been consulted as recommended by the Anderson Committee, made it clear in correspondence with the Scottish Education Department and at a meeting with the Department on 29th July, 1960, that the Association was of the view that the cost of the awards should be borne wholly by the Government, and that accordingly the Department should be the award-making body, and that local education authorities should act as their agents in performing those functions which can best be carried out locally.
The local authority associations have adopted that attitude right from the beginning. They accept that the Secretary of State should make the awards, and they accept, too, that the general grant should be reduced. But what they object to is the determination of the Secretary of State for Scotland not only to reduce the general grant by the proportion of the Exchequer grant for Anderson-type bursaries, but to take from it that proportion of the cost of these bursaries that was financed from the rates.
Paragraph 288 of the Anderson Report, under the heading, "Financial con siderations if grants are paid by local authorities", says:
But, from the authorities' point of view, if the general grant were merely increased by a proportion of the additional cost, the burden they had to bear might still seem a heavy one and they might still say that, as so much local discretion had been removed from them, and as the system of student grants was now conceived as a national one, the whole burden should be borne by the Exchequer.
That position will arise if the Secretary of State adopts the method adopted by the Minister of Education, that if local authorities are to be responsible for these awards there will have to be a larger amount of money in the general grant to meet them.
The next paragraph says:
If, however, the central departments cease to give awards, and all are made a local responsibility, we think it essential that the

amount included in the general grant in aid of the cost of awards should be at least equivalent to the two-thirds of the present cost which is borne by the Exchequer …plus two-thirds of any additional cost; we emphasise that this is a minimum and that in our view, having regard to the predominating 'national' interest and the removal of so much local discretion, the proportion might be greater.
In other words, the whole spirit of this part of the Anderson Report leads one to believe that the Chancellor of the Exchequer ought to be carrying, if not 100 per cent., very nearly that amount of the burden.
But what do we find here? The Secretary of State has decided that 62·4 per cent. of the appropriate figure, that is of the amount spent on the Anderson type bursaries, should be deducted from the general grant for 1961–63 and also that 37·6 per cent., which represents the rate-borne share of the bursaries, should be taken out of general grant. This is where the local authority associations in Scotland and the Secretary of State part company.
6.30 p.m.
In paragraph 9 of the memorandum, we read something with which I wholeheartedly agree:
There is no real mandate for what the Government propose and the Association has submitted that the only possible construction which could be put on paragraph 290 of the Anderson Report (and, indeed, this was the construction put on it not only by the Scottish Local Authority Associations, but also by the English Local Authority Associations), was that there should be deducted from general grant the proportion of Exchequer grant given towards 'Anderson bursaries'.
The proportion of the general grant given to Anderson bursaries is shown as 62·4 per cent. The local authority associations are perfectly willing that that sum should be deducted from general grant, but they are totally opposed to the 37·6 per cent., representing about£3 million, also being deducted.
As the Under-Secretary of State knows, the expenditure on these bursaries will no longer be considered as relevant expenditure for general grant purposes. If it is no longer to be considered as relevant expenditure for general grant purposes, then it seems to me that the Secretary of State has no right whatever to take something into account which is not concerned as relevant expenditure for those purposes. That is exactly what he is doing and what the local authorities are objecting to.
The Secretary of State must realise that it is wrong that expenditure on functions outwith the general grant should be taken into account to reduce the aggregate general grant payable to the local authorities. Again, these views were put forward very strongly by the Scottish local authority associations to the Minister of State on 3rd February, 1961.
I know that the Government love precedents. Time and again, when we have tried to make a case, we have been told either that the precedents are against us, or that there are no precedents at all to support our case. Fortunately, in this matter, we have very important precedents to support the contentions of the local authorities. It is not so very long ago since we had the Mental Health (Scotland) Act, 1960 and the Government in that Act accepted full responsibility for boarded out mental defectives. This responsibility was previously undertaken by the local authorities.
In this instance, when the Government accepted full responsibility for the boarded out mentally defective, the general grant was reduced by 62·4 per cent. of the expenditure that was taken over. The Secretary of State took from the general grant only that part which could be regarded as the Exchequer contribution for boarded out mental defectives. He did not also take the rate contribution. It would seem to me that that is a very recent precedent, a very important one, and one which is similar to the case with which we are dealing this afternoon.
But there is another precedent even more recent. In England, responsibility for Colleges of Advanced Technology, known as C.A.T., is passing from the local education authorities to independent governing bodies. They are to be financed wholly by the Exchequer. Indeed, the local authority associations in England, which keep closely in contact with the local authority associations in Scotland, were very worried. They had discovered what the Secretary of State was proposing to do about the position of the Anderson type bursaries. They were afraid that when the Minister of Education decided to take over the Colleges of Advanced Technology he would work the same trick on them.

They wrote to the Minister of Education to find out exactly what would be their position.
In the local authority memorandum, we find, on page 12, a copy of a letter sent on 26th October, 1961 by the Minister of Education to the Association:
On 5th July, I wrote to you in reply to your letter of 28th June"—

The Temporary Chairman (Mr. John Arbuthnot): I think that the hon. Lady is getting a little wide of the Amendment. She is entitled, of course, to refer to precedents, but not to discuss them in too much detail.

Miss Herbison: With due respect, Mr. Arbuthnot, I find that Ruling very difficult to accept, because here I am making comparisons with another educational matter.

The Temporary Chairman: If the hon. Lady is quoting precedents she is all right, but if she goes further than that she is in danger of getting too wide of the Amendment.

Miss Herbison: I shall try to limit my remarks to dealing with the precedents.
The sum total of the representations of the English local authority associations was that they received in writing a specific guarantee from the Minister of Education that when the Colleges of Advanced Technology are taken over they will lose from the general grant only that proportion of the general grant which represents the Exchequer contribution for these colleges. That works out at about 56·3 per cent. In other words, 56·3 per cent. of the cost of running these colleges was borne by the Exchequer and was represented in the general grant. The other 43·7 per cent. was carried by the local authorities on the rates.
The Minister of Education has said that he will take the 56·3 per cent. out of the general grant, but he has not said that in addition he will take the 43·7 per cent. He has given an assurance that all that is being taken out is the 56·3 per cent.
In view of that assurance, our local authorities just cannot understand the determination of the Secretary of State to adhere to his decision to take the whole cost of these grants—the Exchequer proportion and the rate-borne proportion—out of the general grant.
The local authority associations have made out a very strong case. Local authorities will be acting as agents. They will be doing the preliminary work, and sifting the information, and so on. That information will then be sent to the Department, which will make a decision—and whether or not that decision is one to which the local authority agrees it will be forced to help pay the bill. That is wrong.
I hope that the Under-Secretary has been able to give further consideration to the matter since Friday, and now realises that all freedom has been taken from local authorities in this matter. They have accepted that, but if we now take freedom of decision from them we have no right to place a financial obligation on their shoulders.

Mr. Hannan: One of the difficulties about debates on a Bill which covers the United Kingdom, but has separate Clauses affecting Scotland, on the one hand, and England and Wales, on the other, is deciding just how much discomfort is caused to those who are listening—because many of the points now being raised have already been discussed in Committee. I appreciate that Ministers and members of the Committee have already heard many of these points. Nevertheless, as one who had the privilege of serving on the Committee I want to utter a few words in support of the Amendment.
I hope that the Under-Secretary will bear in mind what my hon. Friend said and will be able to give us some information about the meeting that took place on Friday last. Are we to assume that the position is as it was, with both sides standing pat, and refusing to shift? We would all agree with the proposition that if the Government are going to accept responsibility for the payment of the Anderson awards they are entitled to deduct the relevant amount from the general grant, but exception is taken to the fact that, in addition, they are to ask local authorities to continue to make their rate-borne contribution to such expenditure, despite the fact that, apparently, an agreement was arrived at on paragraph 292 of the Anderson Report, and it was accepted that, as the Report says:

the central departments might be the award-making bodies, in the sense that they would make the final decisions …but the local authorities would act as their agents …
It is within the recollection of hon. Members that in some cases where local authorities act as agents, far from making a contribution they receive consideration from the Government for that service. I should have thought that if there was any service in respect of which local authorities ought to qualify in that sense it would have been this one. How can the Minister interpret paragraph 290 of the Anderson Report in this fashion? How can they say that when they take over this service, which will be a national service, local authorities should continue to make a contribution of about 37 per cent? It cannot be part of the Government's case that expenditure on a function outwith the general grant should be taken into consideration in order to reduce the aggregate amount paid by the local auhorities.
6.45 p.m.
As my hon. Friend has said, not only the Scottish local authorities, but those in England and Wales, have made precisely the same representations. In view of that fact the Government seem to be running counter to their oft-proclaimed policy of giving local authorities freedom. There is no freedom about this; there is an element of compulsion about it. As I understand, it has been agreed with the Scottish local authorities that the Department will be the principal and the local authorities the agents. That was the understanding as long ago as July, 1960, and I hope that the Under-Secretary will confirm that still is.
It is also worth looking at paragraph 285 of the Report, which says:
The prime objection likely to be raised against handling the awards system wholly centrally is the claim that it would involve an unwelcome amount of bureaucratic remote control "—
and I am inclined to agree—
or, put more specifically, that the functions of an award-making body, particularly those which are discretionary, could not be handled so satisfactorily from London, Edinburgh, and Cardiff as from a number of local centres.
That is the correct decision, but we profoundly disagree as to the method of financing it. If the local authorities regard this as a good method the Government should accept the whole


responsibility and should not make this alteration.
The sum involved is about£3½million this year—1961–62. It was larger than was estimated. In 1962–63, it will be£3·78 million. The Government mean to reduce the general grant by those amounts. Local authorities, on the other hand, say that only two-thirds of the general grant should be retained for that purpose. I do not want to belabour the argument, which has already been well stated, but local authorities feel very strongly about this. We regard this Amendment as the most important one to be discussed tonight, and we hope that the Minister will be able to give us some hope that at least all has not yet been lost, and that there is a possibility that the Government will accept the Amendment.

Mr. James Dempsey: I want to put one question to the Under-Secretary. Most of my hon. Friends have welcomed the provisions for centralising awards. In my view, this is like the curate's egg—good in parts.

Miss Herbison: We have not welcomed the Clause.

Mr. Dempsey: I am referring to the application of centralised grants.
I agree that local authority contributions should be exempt, and that if the Government are to run the scheme they should pay for it. I know some local authorities who would be much more generous in applying awards of this nature than would the centralised agency in St. Andrew's House, Edinburgh—and they are the authorities who, with the recipients, will be penalised.
It is very ironical that we should now be discussing the nationalisation of these awards by a Conservative Administration. Hon. Members on this side of the Committee, naturally, welcome that type of principle. What they take exception to is the fact that the Government, in addition to taking their contribution, should forcibly extract from the local authorities a rateable contribution towards the awards. We are bound to complain because, after all, people elect their own local authority to manage their own education services, and its finances.
I am sorry that many speeches have not been made in this debate to refer to this important point. As a result of this centralisation in issuing awards, there is discrimination against married applicants who are under 25 years of age, and who are being refused allowances for their wives. That was never done in the past under the local authority scheme of administration. I direct the attention of the Under-Secretary to this practice. He has had brought before him a case from Coatbridge, which I represent, and he is aware of this departure in principle in the application of these awards. When he replies to the debate, I ask him, in view of the fact that the Government are forcibly extracting from local authorities their rateable contribution, to allow the local authorities' practice to operate in the case of young students by giving the allowance for a dependent wife.

Mr. Brooman-White: I appreciate the moderation with which the hon. Lady the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) fairly stated the attitude which the local authorities have been adopting in the long discussions that we have had on this subject.
I should like, first, to express everyone's appreciation of the original approach by local authorities to the whole problem. They saw that, because our problem in Scotland was of a size which could conveniently be managed centrally, there would be great advantage to students in having it so managed. That has been recognised in the debates we have had upstairs in Committee. The local authorities said, "We shall accept the principle and work out the finances later."
The Government said throughout, at that time and later, "We appreciate this Our attitude to the financial question is that the local authorities should be neither better nor worse off as a result of the change." The local authorities said they would not accept that. They would argue in favour of being better off, but they said, "Let us go ahead with the administrative organisation". That is the pattern as it has developed
All general grant questions are complex, but it would be tidier to deal, first, with the two precedents the hon. Lady raised. The first had to do with the Mental Health (Scotland) Act, 1960. I


shall endeavour to deal with that in general terms. The mental health arrangement was made at the time when the new general grant formula was under discussion. The rate-borne expenditure was disregarded, but in those discussions the Minister of State made it clear to the local authorities that he could not accept this as a precedent.
The second had to do with the C.A.T.S. I cannot accept that as a precedent for this suggested arrangement. Broadly speaking, the C.A.T.s are coming into line with the financial arrangements which apply to the central institutions in Scotland. The C.A.T.s have been doing work analogous to that of the central institutions. The central institutions have been 100 per cent. Exchequer aided and C.A.T.S will be 100 per cent. Exchequer aided. To that extent, they will catch up with an advantage which our central institutions hitherto have enjoyed.

Miss Herbison: The hon. Gentleman, of course, knows that local authorities will still be bearing a financial burden in Scotland in some instances for work that is being done in the C.A.T.S in England.

Mr. Brooman-White: If any point arises in which local authorities feel that there is a discrepancy between England and Scotland in the treatment of technical institutions, it is perfectly open to them to raise that point on its merits. I do not think that that is a parallel with student grants.
On student grants, the English pattern is that the distribution between the Exchequer and local authorities will be as hitherto. In Scotland, we are deducting from the grant the amount which the Exchequer would normally have contributed. The original estimate for local authority expenditure over the period was about£9½million—I am rounding the figures. Under the present arrangements they have been left with expenditure of about£2 million, and the problem we are discussing is what is to happen about the£7½million.
I may add that the Exchequer is taking over the whole of the increase which arises out of the improved scale. This is not the case in England. We are advantageously placed as compared with England in that connection. We deduct£4½million, which is the contribution

the Exchequer would have made, and we are arguing whether the local authority should or should not carry the£2¾million they would have carried in any case.
The hon. Lady, the hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) and the hon. Member for Coatbridge and Airdrie (Mr. Dempsey)—who ingeniously brought in a constituency case—have argued that because the local authorities hitherto admitted the merits of centralisation, and kindly offered to assist in it, they should be relieved of this expenditure, and the rates would benefit to the extent of£2¾million. We have not accepted that view, and I state clearly that we do not accept it.
In comparison with England, that would place us in an unjustifiably advantageous position. The English local authority is carrying a share, as hitherto, of the bursaries and a share of the increased bursaries. We are carrying the increase on the Exchequer, and we feel that it would not be anywhere remotely within the concept of "neither better nor worse off" to make a reduction which would in fact leave the local authorities£2¾million better off. This is the argument we have sustained throughout the negotiations.
I appreciate the way in which the case has been put, but this is the position on which the Government stand. In due course, we shall promulgate a general grant Order. If the House does not like it, it will take the normal action in those circumstances. The question the Committee is discussing is: should the local authorities of Scotland benefit to the extent of£2¾million of expenditure which they no longer incur? We do not think that that is justified.

Mr. Dempsey: I do not think that the Committee should allow the hon. Gentleman to get out so lightly. Now you are forcibly extracting a rateable contribution from local authorities in Scotland—

The Temporary Chairman: I am not extracting anything.

Mr. Dempsey: Pardon my unparliamentary vocabulary, Mr. Arbuthnot. Now that the Minister is forcibly extracting a rateable contribution from Scottish local authorities will he say that the


recipients of awards will not be worse off as a result?

Mr. Brooman-White: I shall certainly look at the question whether we can do anything to help anyone who is substantially worse off. My general impression is that cases previously dealt with by local authorities have been generously treated hitherto.

7.0 p.m.

Miss Herbison: The Under-Secretary took the first comparison I made as a precedent and brushed it aside by suggesting that when the Government did this they made it quite clear to the local authorities that this would not be a precedent, and that was all. Then he said that, compared with England, the Government must not allow the Scottish local authorities to be better off. We cannot make an exact comparison with England. Although there are to be much tighter regulations than previously, and perhaps regulations where there were none before, English and Welsh local authorities will have certain matters of decision. These matters of decision have been completely taken out of the hands of the local authorities in Scotland, and that is a very important matter when

we are discussing the financial arrangements.

This is where the difficulty has arisen all along in the discussions with the local authorities. The hon. Gentleman said that the question before us is quite a simple one: should the local authorities benefit to the extent of between£2 million and£3 million? That is not the only question before us. This is a matter of very important principles. The first principle is: should they have to pay the piper when they have no controls at all? That is an important one.

The second principle, which is also very important, is: can the Secretary of State take into consideration something that is not now liable for relevant expenditure under the general grant? The Under-Secretary has left these issues completely untouched. They have not been dealt with in discussions with the local authority associations, and they have not been dealt with tonight. It has been a most unsatisfactory reply, and we propose now to divide the Committee.

Question put, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause:—

The Commitee divided: Ayes 162. Noes 112.

Division No. 112.]
AYES
[7.2 p.m.


Agnew, Sir Peter
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)


Allason, James
Doughty, Charles
James, David


Ashton, Sir Hubert
du Cann, Edward
Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)


Atkins, Humphrey
Duncan, Sir James
Jennings, J. C.


Balniel, Lord
Eccles, Rt. Hon. Sir David
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)


Barlow, Sir John
Eden, John
Johnson Smith, Geoffrey


Batsford, Brian
Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
Kerans, Cdr. J. S.


Baxter, Sir Beverley (Southgate)
Elliott, R. W. (Nwcastle-upon-Tyne, N.)
Kerby, Capt. Henry


Bennett, F. M. (Torquay)
Farey-Jones, F. W.
Kershaw, Anthony


Berkeley, Humphry
Farr, John
Kimball, Marcus


Bitten, John
Finlay, Graeme
Kitson, Timothy


Bishop, F. P.
Gammans, Lady
Lancaster, Col. C. G.


Box, Donald
Gardner, Edward
Langford-Holt, Sir John


Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hon. J.
Gilmour, Sir John
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)


Braine, Bernard
Glover, Sir Douglas
Lindsay, Sir Martin


Brooman-White, R.
Goodhew, Victor
Linstead, Sir Hugh


Brown, Alan (Tottenham)
Grant, Rt. Hon. William
Litchfield, Capt. John


Browne, Percy (Torrington)
Grant-Ferris, Wg. Cdr. R.
Longden, Gilbert


Buck, Antony
Green, Alan
Loveys, Walter H.


Bullus, Wing Commander Eric
Gresham Cooke, R.
MacArthur, Ian


Burden, F. A.
Gurden, Harold
McLaren, Martin


Chataway, Christopher
Hall, John (Wycombe)
McLaughlin, Mrs. Patricia


Chichester-Clark, R.
Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)
Macleod, Rt. Hn. lain (Enfield, W.)


Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)
Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)
Markham, Major Sir Frank


Cole, Norman
Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere (Macclesf'd)
Marten, Neil


Collard, Richard
Hastings, Stephen
Mathew, Robert (Honiton)


Cooper, A. E.
Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel
Matthews, Gordon (Meriden)


Cooper-Key, Sir Neill
Hicks Beach, Mal. W.
Mawby, Ray


Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Hiley, Joseph
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.


Corfield, F. V.
Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)
Mott-Radclyffe, Sir Charles


Coulson, Michael
Hirst, Geoffrey
Osborn, John (Hallam)


Craddock, Sir Beresford
Holland, Philip
Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)


Critchley, Julian
Hollingworth, John
Page, Graham (Crosby)


Crosthwalte-Eyre, Col. Sir Oliver
Hornsby-Smith, Rt. Hon. Dame P.
Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)


Curran, Charles
Hughes-Young, Michael
Peel, John


Dance, James
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Percival, Ian




Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth
Speir, Rupert
Turton, Rt. Hon. R. H.


Pilkington, Sir Richard
Stanley, Hon. Richard
van Straubenzee, W. R.


Pitman, Sir James
Stevens, Geoffrey
Vane, W. M. F.


Pitt, Miss Edith
Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)
Vickers, Miss Joan


Pott, Percivall
Stodart, J. A.
Wakefield, Edward (Derbyshire, W.)


Rawlinson, Peter
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm
Walder, David


Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin
Studholme, Sir Henry
Walker, Peter


Ridley, Hon. Nicholas
Summers, Sir Spencer (Aylesbury)
Ward, Dame Irene


Ridsdale, Julian
Talbot, John E.
Whitelaw, William


Robinson, Rt Hn Sir R. (B'pool, S.)
Tapsell, Peter
Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)


Roots, William
Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)
Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)


Royle, Anthony (Richmond, Surrey)
Taylor, Frank (M'ch'str, Moss Side)
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Russell, Ronald
Teeling, Sir William
Wise, A. R.


Scott-Hopkins, James
Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret
Woodnutt, Mark


Sharples, Richard
Thomas, Leslie (Canterbury)
Woollam, John


Skeet, T. H. H.
Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)
Worsley, Marcus


Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'd &amp; Chiswick)
Thorneycroft, Rt. Hon. Peter



Smithers, Peter
Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Spearman, Sir Alexander
Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon
Mr. Gordon Campbell and




Mr. Michael Hamilton.




NOES


Ainsley, William
Herbison, Miss Margaret
Peart, Frederick


Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)
Holman, Percy
Proctor, W. T.


Beaney, Alan
Holt, Arthur
Randall, Harry


Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J.
Houghton, Douglas
Rhodes, H.


Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)
Howell, Charles A. (Perry Barr)
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Blackburn, F.
Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)
Robertson, John (Paisley)


Blyton, William
Hunter, A. E.
Rogers, G. H. R. (Kensington, N.)


Bowden, Rt. Hn. H. W. (Leics. S. W.)
Janner, Sir Barnett
Ross, William


Brockway, A. Fenner
Jay, Rt. Hon. Douglas
Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)


Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)
Jeger, George
Skeffington, Arthur


Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)
Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)
Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)


Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)
Jones, Rt. Hn. A. Creech (Wakefield)
Snow, Julian


Callaghan, James
Jones, Elwyn (West Ham, S.)
Sorensen, R. W.


Chapman, Donald
Kelley, Richard
Steele, Thomas


Corbet, Mrs. Freda
Kenyon, Clifford
Stonehouse, John


Davies, Harold (Leek)
King, Dr. Horace
Stones, William


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Lee, Frederick (Newton)
Strauss, Rt. Hn. G. R. (Vauxhall)


Deer, George
Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)
Stross, Dr. Barnett (Stoke-on-Trent, C.)


Dempsey, James
Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)
Swain, Thomas


Dodds, Norman
Mahon, Dr. J. Dickson
Symonds, J. B.


Driberg, Tom
McInnes, James
Thompson, Dr. Alan (Dunfermline)


Ede, Rt. Hon. C.
McKay, John (Wallsend)
Thomson, G. M. (Dundee, E.)


Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
McLeavy, Frank
Thorpe, Jeremy


Evans, Albert
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)



Fletcher, Eric
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Tomney, Frank


Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)
Marsh, Richard
Ungoed-Thomas, Sir Lynn


Forman, J. C.
Mendelson, J. J.
Wainwright, Edwin


Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Mitchlson, G. R.
Warbey, William


Galpern, Sir Myer
Monslow, Walter
Weitzman, David


Ginsburg, David
Moody, A. S.
White, Mrs. Eirene


Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.
Morris, John
Whitlock, William


Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
Moyle, Arthur
Willey, Frederick


Griffiths, W. (Exchange)
Mulley, Frederick
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Grimond, Rt. Hon. J.
Noel-Baker, Rt. Hn. Philip (Derby, S.)
Willis, E. G. (Edinburgh, E.)


Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)
Oliver, G. H.
Yates, Victor (Ladywood)


Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley)
Oram, A. E.



Hannan, William
Paget, R. T.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Hart, Mrs. Judith
Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)
Mr. Lawson and Mr. Redhead.


Hayman, F. H.
Parker, John

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 9.—(SCHOOL LEAVING DATES IN ENGLAND AND WALES.)

Mrs. Eirene White: I beg to move, in page 8, line 39, after "(4)" to insert "and (8)".

The Temporary Chairman: I suggest that it would be for the convenience of the Committee to discuss at the same time two further Amendments. The first is in page 9, line 37, at the end to insert:
(8) Notwithstanding any provision of this section, the Minister may by regulation provide that if a person attains an age which (apart

from this section) would be the upper limit of the compulsory school age on any date between such dates as the Minister may determine he shall be deemed not to have attained that age until the end of the appropriate summer term.
The second is in Clause 10, page 9, line 43, to leave out line 43 and to insert:
(b) one school-leaving date.

Mrs. White: We agree that these three Amendments go together. They all deal with school-leaving dates, and although the conditions in Scotland are different from those in England and Wales, the principle concerned in the Amendments is the same. The Scottish Amendment


states categorically that there should be one leaving date. The Amendment for England and Wales is not so categoric; we ask the Minister to give himself power, at a later stage if he does not wish to do it immediately, to establish one leaving date. If the Bill is passed unamended the Minister will be obliged to retain two leaving dates for the year.
We argued forcibly in Committee—so forcibly that it is not necessary for me to repeat all the arguments—that although we are strongly in favour of one leaving date being established forthwith, because educationally there is no doubt that it is desirable, if the Minister felt that at the moment he could not do so because this is a year of intermission with a shortage of teachers, at least he should make it possible by regulation to establish one leaving date as soon as possible.
7.15 p.m.
Since we had the argument in Committee my opinion has been even further strengthened. I have paid several visits recently to secondary modern schools, some in my constituency and some elsewhere. On each occasion, with the permission of the staff, I have asked which children were proposing to leave school having attained or being about to attain the age of 15. Far from finding that the majority of the children were great, hulking, adolescent louts to whom nothing could be taught if they stayed on at school, I found that quite a number of them were little shrimps who would have done very much better by staying on at school and growing up in more senses than one. Looking at some of these children it seemed lamentable that they should be sent out into the world straight away. It would be very much to their advantage if they had the minimum of a complete fourth year of secondary education, which is what we ask.
The Minister is convinced of this educationally. All the teachers' organisations are in favour of it Teachers say that although it will be an improvement to have the Christmas leaving date eliminated, and to have only two leaving dates, one at Easter and one at the end of the summer term, the fact that a number of children will be leaving at Easter is extremely distracting and disturbing

not only to those who are leaving but also to those who are remaining in school. Those who remain until the end of the summer term, because their birthdays fall a little later in the year, are disturbed and distracted because their school fellows are leaving.
The general opinion of educationists is that this distraction is such that those about to leave school feel that what happens in school does not matter very much and their whole interest is centred outside and not inside the school walls. This, they say, is contagious, which means that it is not only that part of the class which is to leave at Easter which does not obtain the full benefit of what teachers are trying to impart; others, who will complete the year, tend to regard the school as not all that important or exciting and to look to the outer world.
We had this experience before when the school-leaving age was being raised to 15. When children left at 14 there was the same distraction in their last term. We are asking that we should base our action on educational grounds. I know that there are some difficulties over employment, but this is an Education Bill, the responsibility of the Minister of Education, and he should put the priorities on education. There is a shortage of teachers at present, and I do not propose to go into the reasons why there is or whose fault it is. I recognise, however, that there may be practical difficulties at the moment, particularly in the year of intermission. Nevertheless, I cannot see how the Minister can reject the Amendment which would give him powers later to establish one leaving date.

Mr. Hannan: I should like to support in principle the Amendment moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Flint, East (Mrs. White), although the Amendment relating to Scotland proposes that one school-leaving date should be established instead of the two proposed in the Bill.
Reference is made in Clause 10 to Section 33 of the Scottish Act, which already gives the Secretary of State power to signify two or more leaving dates. It seems to me that although the Bill provides for two dates, in subsection (1,b) (ii) the Secretary of State is still


providing that he should have some reserve powers to have more than two leaving dates. This is why some of us would like him to be limited to one such date, principally on educational grounds.
We do not need to sell this case to the Minister of Education. The Minister is to be complimented on what he said on Second Reading on 13th November, first about the facilities for work and secondly about the educational grounds. He said:
In particular, there is a strong feeling in some areas which are subject to special economic difficulties that there should be a fair spread of the times at which pupils leave school, so as to make it easier for them to find suitable employment.
Certain hon. Members on this side think that that is the pressure at work upon Ministers of Education to satisfy the needs of employers, particularly in some agricultural areas of Scotland, and no doubt in England and Wales. Year after year we pressed for the abolition of the powers which were given to local authorities to enable pupils to go potato lifting. The Government assisted us, and the powers disappeared this year. On educational grounds we think that the number of school-leaving dates should be reduced from two to one.
It is on educational grounds that the Minister's observations were first class. Referring to young people leaving school as early as they could after the age of 15 he said:
This is not right in the second half of the twentieth century. Educationists and social workers are insistent and unanimous that the very great majority of early leavers would gain more from another year in full-time education than from their first year at this young age in a job. This view should command the full support of the House."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 13th November, 1961; Vol. 649, c. 45.]
These are admirable words.
I wish it were possible for the Minister to convince the Chancellor of the Exchequer and his Cabinet colleagues that today we are on the brink of an upsurge. Whether it is an admirable thing or not, more young people will stay on at school. The proposal in the Amendment recognises only what some of us believe will be a fact in five or six years. In Scotland more young people are staying on at school and completing their five-year course. The Government and local authorities

are faced with the frightful problem that only one in four young people qualified to enter a university find a place. In England and Wales the figure is one in nine.
There is also the Government's failure to raise the school-leaving age to 16, for reasons which many of us appreciate but disagree with, and their failure to give effect to the Crowther Report. The Amendments, if accepted, would go a long way to achieving the objective without formal sanction by Statute to the raising of the school-leaving age.
We are concerned about this matter because it affects the 80 per cent. of our school population who have had the rawest deal in the education set-up. It affects young people aged 15 who are sent out into the world ill-equipped to face the vagaries and blandishments of the casino-type society which confronts them.
The provision in the Bill of two school-leaving dates is an advance on what we have in Scotland at the moment. Many people think that Scottish education has led the world. It has for many years, but in this one respect we have been behind England and Wales. It is not generally known that there are from three to seven different leaving dates in Scotland. This is deplorable. It should have been attended to long ago. It may seem to the Committee that we want to go to the other extreme by providing for only one leaving date, but my hon. Friends and I believe that if we are interested in education we must do what we can to establish this.
We welcome the provision of two leaving dates for 1963, but note with apprehension that later in the Clause the Secretary of State is still leaving himself flexible powers to provide three dates in circumstances which he thinks advantageous. Further, it provides that three leaving dates may be fixed for any school in any area. It particularises. Is it right that the young people in that area attending that school should be penalised? Most of us take good care that our own young people have every facility for staying on at school as long as they can. It is part of our case that this should apply to the young people who will be the artisans, mechanics and technicians of the future. We have fallen


down on the job. We decide to have the school-leaving date as soon after the age of 15 as possible, when children are in their most formative period.
My hon. Friends and I think that this is wrong. We hope that the Amendment will receive support. It is an invidious position that junior secondary pupils in Scotland are subject to a leaving date to which senior pupils are not subject, because they go on to complete their scholastic career and have other opportunities. Many young people of 15 go out to jobs unskilled. They do not have the opportunity to take an apprenticeship. There are very few day-release courses in Scotland compared with the number in England and Wales.
I subscribe wholeheartedly to the statement made by Crowther that, if education be regarded as a social service, there is no social injustice more in need of reform than that where scores of thousands are released into the labour market. I know that there is a teacher shortage. Scotland has a teacher shortage of 3,600. By 1965 we shall be 5,000 short. If some of our young people were given more encouragement, we could draw some recruits to the teaching profession from this source.
The growing trend is for young people to stay on. Mr. Vaizey, in a valuable pamphlet entitled "Investment for Success", points out that in the last three years an increasing number of young people have stayed on at school, namely, about 1·65 per cent. In January, 1959, the number of those continuing on at school was 38·3 per cent. of the total. He estimates that by 1970 the number will have grown to 75 per cent.
Can the Government give any indication of their intentions? What provision are they likely to make to meet such a contingency? The idea that the academic person whose highway is quite clear from the primary school to the university is in some way superior to the boy in the workshop, who is a skilled engineer, is dying hard. Yet Britain will depend upon these young people in future with their skills and crafts, especially in relation to exports and world competition. There are different ways of being clever in this world, just as there are different roads to the Kingdom of Heaven. I should like to see the Amendment accepted so that we could

get nearer to the goal of real interest in education. The real question is not raising the school-leaving age to 16. It is how best we can make schools more interesting to young people so that they will voluntarily stay on and learn something of the skills and crafts they will need in the outside world. Because of this deep interest, I hope that the Committee can be persuaded to accept these Amendments.

7.30 p.m.

The Minister of Education (Sir David Eccles): I think that we are agreed on two points. First, we want the same leaving dates on both sides of the Border. Secondly, as people interested in education, we want our children to stay longer at school than they now do. One way would be to have a single leaving date. As I said in the speech which the hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) has been good enough to quote, I am sorry that we cannot go at once to one leaving date, but there are good reasons for having this half-way house.
The Crowther Committee encountered the same kind of difficulties in the employment of young people as we have when we have gone into the subject with much wider consultation. If we had one leaving date for England and Wales it would mean half a million children going on to the labour market at one time. I am confident that, before long, industry and the other employments will be able to tackle that number, but at present they do not feel that they could.
It is very difficult to go against the advice we have had from the Ministry of Labour's National Joint Committee, on which the representatives of the employers, the nationalised industries and the trade unions were unanimous. As I told the Standing Committee, my Department went to that Committee and made the best case it could for the one leaving date.
If the Scottish Amendment were accepted it would produce a very awkward situation, because the one leaving date would come into operation directly the Bill became law, and that would create difficulties for the schools on administrative grounds alone. I therefore doubt whether it would be workable. The Amendments from England are very difficult to understand—

Mrs. White: And Wales.

Sir D. Eccles: Yes, and Wales—I am glad to see that the hon. Lady is sporting her Welsh emblem today.
As she said, their intention is quite clear. It is that the Minister should be given power to go from two leaving dates to one leaving date as and when he was advised that it was right to do so, but the difficulty is that he is to do that by Regulation when it should be done by Order. The Minister would be given the power to pick out a particular person, or sets of persons, and he would also be able to select two dates, and say that if the birthday of a child fell between the selected dates, that child—but not necessarily all children—would have to stay to the end of the summer term. If we were to write into the Bill a power to go from two leaving dates to one we should have to do so in a very different way from that suggested. That, perhaps, is not as important as the question of whether or not we should put the power into the Bill in correct form.
Where, in an education Measure, the principle of the reform is written into the Statute—for example, that the school-leaving age should be raised to 16, which is in the Education Act—it seems to me to be quite proper for the House to give the Minister the power to do that, and to do nothing else—by Order in Council in that case—when he feels that he can do so, but here we are not really sure that we want to go to one leaving date. We have not put that in the Bill in the same way as the school-leaving age is put in the 1944 Act.
There is one reason why we should hesitate, at any rate, for a little time. From now onwards consideration must be given to whether the next step in keeping children at school should be one leaving date, or raising the leaving age to 16. If the school-leaving age were raised to 16 and there was one leaving date, more than half the children would stay at school until after they were 16½. I am not sure—and I think that we must give a good deal of attention to this—which reform should come next.
The one now suggested is, of course, much the easier one, because it does not put much strain on the teachers. It is quite true that in the next year, when we have a "year of intermission", the

schools will be unusually short, but the teachers will have looked after those children for two terms out of a fourth year, there will be the same number of children in the school and, by and large, if the teachers can manage them for two terms I think that they will be able to manage them for three. It would, however, produce a position in which more than half the children were staying on until after 15½.
I do not know whether it will seem wise, after some time, to raise the school-leaving age by a year, so I ask hon. Members not to press the point, but to leave things as they are. That means that if we decide to go to one leaving date, we shall have to come to the House for the power. I think it right not to take that power in this Bill, because we have not completely decided that we want to do it, and have not put one leaving date in the Bill.
I can tell the hon. Member for Mary-hill that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State deliberately left in Clause 10 the power to make exceptions to the two leaving dates. He did so solely on employment grounds. There are, I am sorry to say, patches of unemployment in Scotland that are substantially above the national level, and my right hon. Friend felt that where those patches were persisting it might not be in the best interests of the children to let them all out at the same time. If a certain number of those young people had to wait to get jobs, in an area where there were not too many jobs, we all know that it would be the less able child who would have to wait, and that is just the child whose character is not at all suited to a period of unemployment.
In those circumstances, I think that my right hon. Friend is fully justified in retaining these provisos. It is not done on education grounds but on employment grounds. After all, we are thinking of the child's whole life, in school and then in employment, and we must not do anything in the educational part of the child's life that makes entry into work less smooth that it otherwise would be.
I hope that hon. Members will accept that we on this side have not changed our minds at all. We know the educational advantage of having one leaving date, but we feel that, at present, we


must accept the advice of those concerned with employment. In any case, we could not accept the Scottish Amendment because its provisions would come into operation as soon as the Bill became law, and that is impossible. I do not advise the Committee to accept the English Amendments, because they concern a serious question which we should deal with by coming back to the House and asking for powers in the normal way.

Mr. Frederick Willey: I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will know that I find his reply very disappointing—and very unnecessary. We are agreed that, on educational grounds, a single leaving date would be better than two leaving dates. We debated this in the Standing Committee, when the right hon. Gentleman relied on the advice tendered by the Minister of Labour's Advisory Committee. We did not accept that advice as being as dogmatic as the Minister felt it to be, and we are now returning to the question in a different form.
We are saying that we will not impose an obligation on the Minister to have one single leaving date now, but we do not want him to be in the position of

having to come back to the House to seek new powers by legislation. We appreciate the difficulties in promoting legislation that exist in the case of a Department such as the Ministry of Education and we thought that the Minister would have adopted a different approach and would have been prepared to do this either by Regulation or by Order—and my hon. Friends are not doctrinaire about which one he would wish to adopt.

The raising of the school-leaving age to 16, is, we believe, a matter on which the right hon. Gentleman should take an immediate decision. We realise that these two questions are associated and cannot be divorced, but the right hon. Gentleman can increase the school-leaving age to 16 by Order. We felt that he should be in a similar position with regard to the single leaving date.

As we cannot accept his reply as being satisfactory, indeed, we consider it to be most disappointing, I have no alternative but to ask my hon. Friends to divide the Committee.

Question put, That those words be there inserted:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 101, Noes 157.

Division No. 113.]
AYES
[7.42 p.m.


Ainsley, William
Hayman, F. H.
Proctor, W. T.


Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)
Herbison, Miss Margaret
Randall, Harry


Beaney, Alan
Holman, Percy
Rhodes, H.


Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)
Holt, Arthur
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Blackburn, F.
Houghton, Douglas
Robertson, John (Paisley)


Blyton, William
Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)
Ross, William


Bowden, Rt. Hn. H. W. (Leics, S. W.)
Hunter, A. E.
Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)


Brockway, A. Fenner
Janner, Sir Barnett
Skeffington, Arthur


Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)
Jeger, George
Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)


Callaghan, James
Jones, Elwyn (West Ham, S.)
Snow, Julian


Chapman, Donald
Kelley, Richard
Sorensen, R. W.


Corbet, Mrs. Freda
Kenyon, Clifford
Stonehouse, John


Davies, Harold (Leek)
King, Dr. Horace
Stones, William


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Lawson, George
Strachey, Rt. Hon. John


Deer, George
Lee, Frederick (Newton)
Stross, Dr. Barnett (Stoke-on-Trent, C.)


Dempsey, James
Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)
Symonds, J. B.


Dodds, Norman
Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)
Thompson, Dr. Alan (Dunfermline)


Driberg, Tom
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson
Thomson, G. M. (Dundee, E.)


Ede, Rt. Hon. C.
McInnes, James
Thorpe, Jeremy


Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
McLeavy, Frank
Tomney, Frank


Evans, Albert
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)
Ungoed-Thomas, Sir Lynn


Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Wainwright, Edwin


Forman, J. C.
Mitchison, G. R.
Warbey, William


Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Monslow, Walter
Weitzman, David


Galpern, Sir Myer
Moody, A. S.
White, Mrs. Eirene


Ginsburg, David
Morris, John
Whitlock, William


Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.
Movie, Arthur
Willey, Frederick


Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
Mulley, Frederick
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Griffiths, W. (Exchange)
Noel-Baker, Rt. Hn. Philip (Derby, S.)
Willis, E. G. (Edinburgh, E.)


Grimond, Rt. Hon. J.
Oram, A. E.
Winterbottom, R. E.


Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)
Paget, R. T.
Yates, Victor (Ladywood)


Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley)
Pannell, Charles (Leeds W.)



Hamilton, William (West Fife)
Pargiter, G. A.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Hannan, William
Parker, John
Mr. Charles A. Howell and


Hart, Mrs. Judith
Peart, Frederick
Mr. Redhead.




NOES


Agnew, Sir Peter
Grant-Ferris, Wg. Cdr. R.
Pitman, Sir James


Allason, James
Green, Alan
Pitt, Miss Edith


Ashton, Sir Hubert
Gresham Cooke, R.
Pott, Percivall


Atkins, Humphrey
Gurden, Harold
Quennell, Miss J. M.


Balniel, Lord
Hall, John (Wycombe)
Rawlinson, Peter


Barlow, Sir John
Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)
Renton, David


Batsford, Brian
Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)
Ridley, Hon. Nicholas


Baxter, Sir Beverley (Southgate)
Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)
Ridsdale, Julian


Bennett, F. M. (Torquay)
Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere (Macclesf'd)
Robinson, Rt Hn Sir R. (B'pool, S.)


Berkeley, Humphry
Hastings, Stephen
Roots, William


Biffen, John
Hiley, Joseph
Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard


Bishop, F. P.
Hirst, Geoffrey
Russell, Ronald


Box, Donald
Holland, Philip
Sandys, Rt. Hon. Duncan


Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hon. J.
Hornby, R. P.
Scott-Hopkins, James


Boyle, Sir Edward
Hughes-Young, Michael
Sharples, Richard


Braine, Bernard
Hulbert, Sir Norman
Shepherd, William


Brooman-White, R.
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Skeet, T. H. H.


Brown, Alan (Tottenham)
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'd &amp; Chiswick)


Buck, Antony
Jackson, John
Smithers, Peter


Burden, F. A.
James, David
Spearman, Sir Alexander


Campbell, Cordon (Moray &amp; Nairn)
Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)
Speir, Rupert


Chataway, Christopher
Jennings, J. C.
Stanley, Hon. Richard


Chichester-Clark, R.
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)
Stevens, Geoffrey


Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)
Johnson Smith, Geoffrey
Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)


Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)
Kerans, Cdr. J. S.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm


Cole, Norman
Kerby, Capt. Henry
Studholme, Sir Henry


Collard, Richard
Kerr, Sir Hamilton
Summers, Sir Spencer (Aylesbury)


Cooper, A. E.
Kershaw, Anthony
Talbot, John E.


Cooper-Key, Sir Neill
Kimball, Marcus
Tapsell, Peter


Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Lancaster, Col. C. G.
Taylor, Frank (M'ch'st'r, Moss Side)


Corfield, F. V.
Langford-Holt, Sir John
Teeling, Sir William


Coulson, Michael
Leather, E. H. C.
Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret


Craddock Sir Beresford
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Thomas, Leslie (Canterbury)


Critchley, Julian
Lindsay, Sir Martin
Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)


Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. Sir Oliver
Linstead, Sir Hugh
Thompson, Richard (Croydon, S.)


Dance, James
Litchfield, Capt. John
Thorneycroft, Rt. Hon. Peter


d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Longden, Gilbert
Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin


Deedes, W. F.
Loveys, Walter H.
Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon


Doughty, Charles
McLaren, Martin
van Straubenzee, W. R.


du Cann, Edward
McLaughlin, Mrs. Patricia
Vane, W. M. F.


Duncan, Sir James
Macleod, Rt. Hn. lain (Enfield, W.)
Vickers, Miss Joan


Eccles, Rt. Hon. Sir David
Markham, Major Sir Frank
Wakefield, Edward (Derbyshire, W.)


Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
Mathew, Robert (Honiton)
Walder, David


Elliott, R. W. (Nwcstle-upon-Tyne, N.)
Matthews, Gordon (Meriden)
Ward, Dame Irene


Farey-Jones, F. W.
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.
Whitelaw, William


Farr, John
Mott-Radclyffe, Sir Charles
Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)


Finlay, Graeme
Osborn, John (Hallam)
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Gammans, Lady
Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)
Wise, A. R.


Gardner, Edward
Page, Graham (Crosby)
Woodnutt, Mark


Gilmour, Sir John
Pearson, Frank (Clotheroe)
Woollam, John


Glover, Sir Douglas
Perclval, Ian
Worsley, Marcus


Goodhew, Victor
Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth



Grant, Rt. Hon. William
Pilkington, Sir Richard
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:




Mr. J. E. B. Hill and Mr. Peel.

Mr. Willey: I beg to move, in page 9, line 25, to leave out subsection (6).

The Amendment concerns a small point. Subsection (6) provides that the Clause will come into effect not before 1963. In Standing Committee, we argued that it would be possible to bring it into effect this year, in the autumn. We think that the Minister has the good will of the teaching profession and of those concerned with education and that it would be possible to implement the Clause in the autumn. This would be a desirable arrangement.

As the Minister will appreciate, the Crowther Committee, upon whose recommendations the Clause is based, was anxious that its recommendations should

be implemented as soon as possible. A couple of years have gone by. In these circumstances, it is not unreasonable to call upon the Minister to implement the Clause by the autumn, so that it will operate for the next academic year.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Education (Mr. Kenneth Thompson): My right hon. Friend the Minister has discussed a good many of the points which arise out of the proposal by the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) that the Bill should come into operation in time for this year instead of 1963. A good deal of the ground was covered in discussion in Standing Committee. It is true that the strain on the schools would not be


so great as to make the proposal impossible, but this is a difficult year in a good many ways in the schools and we feel that it would be quite wrong to ask the schools to bear whatever additional burden is involved.
This is not a question of more teachers, more teaching space, or great extensions of courses. Nevertheless, the strain that will be felt in the schools in the year of intermission in a great many ways will be far more than people realise. To add this extra burden, however slight, seems to us to be wrong. Therefore, I hope that the Committee will reject the Amendment.
We have also to bear in mind that when this change comes about, it is essential to carry with us the good will of the parents and of the children affected by it. That takes time. It takes time for the local authorities to arrange for the children to be informed when their school life is due to end and for the machinery to be put into operation for parents to know their responsibilities. I hope, therefore, that the Committee will realise that the matter is not quite as simple as appears at first sight.
There is the small technical point, which, no doubt, the hon. Member for

Sunderland, North has considered, but has successfully concealed from the Committee, that if accepted in its present form his Amendment would mean that the Bill would come into operation when it receives the Royal Assent. This would mean that children who attain their 15th birthday in February or March this year, would not be able to leave until the end of the summer term. I am sure that the hon. Member did not have that consequence in mind. For this reason, together with what I have said about the difficulties which arise from moving forward by a year the proposal contained in the Clause, I hope that the Committee will reject the Amendment.

Amendment negatived.

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 10.—(SCHOOL LEAVING DATES IN SCOTLAND.)

Amendment proposed: In page 9, leave out line 43 and insert:

(b) one school-leaving date.—[Mr. Hannan.]

Question put, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 155, Noes 99.

Division No. 114.]
AYES
[7.55 p.m.


Agnew, Sir Peter
Duncan, Sir James
Kerans, Cdr. J. S.


Allason, James
Eccles, Rt. Hon. Sir David
Kerr, Sir Hamilton


Ashton, Sir Hubert
Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
Kershaw, Anthony


Atkins, Humphrey
Elliott, R. W. (Nwcastle-upon-Tyne, N.)
Kimball, Marcus


Balniel, Lord
Farey-Jones, F. W.
Lancaster, Col. C. G.


Barlow, Sir John
Farr, John
Leather, E. H. C.


Batsford, Brian
Finlay, Graeme
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)


Baxter, Sir Beverley (Southgate)
Gammans, Lady
Lindsay, Sir Martin


Bennett, F. M. (Torquay)
Gardner, Edward
Linstead, Sir Hugh


Berkeley, Humphry
Gibson-Watt, David
Litchfield, Capt. John


Bitten, John
Gilmour, Sir John
Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)


Bishop, F. P.
Glover, Sir Douglas
Longden, Gilbert


Box, Donald
Grant, Rt. Hon. William
Loveys, Walter H.


Boyle, Sir Edward
Grant-Ferris, Wg. Cdr. R.
McLaren, Martin


Braine, Bernard
Green, Alan
McLaughlin, Mrs. Patricia


Brooman-White, R.
Gresham Cooke, R.
Macleod, Rt. Hn. Iain (Enfield, W.)


Brown, Alan (Tottenham)
Gurden, Harold
Markham, Major Sir Frank


Buck, Antony
Hall, John (Wycombe)
Mathew, Robert (Honiton)


Burden, F. A.
Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)
Matthews, Gordon (Meriden)


Chataway, Christopher
Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.


Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)
Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)
Mott-Radclyffe, Sir Charles


Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)
Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere (Macclesf'd)
Osborn, John (Hallam)


Cole, Norman
Hastings, Stephen
Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)


Collard, Richard
Hiley, Joseph
Page, Graham (Crosby)


Cooper, A. E.
Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)
Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)


Cooper-Key, Sir Neill
Hirst, Geoffrey
Peel, John


Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Holland, Philip
Percival, Ian


Corfield, F. V.
Hornby, R. P.
Pickthorne, Sir Kenneth


Coulson, Michael
Hughes-Young, Michael
Pilkington, Sir Richard


Craddock, Sir Beresford
Hulbert, Sir Norman
Pitman, Sir James


Critchley, Julian
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Pitt, Miss Edith


Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. Sir Oliver
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Pott, Percivall


Dance, James
Jackson, John
Quennell, Miss J. M.


d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
James, David
Rawlinson, Peter


Deedes, W. F.
Jennings, J. C.
Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin


Doughty, Charles
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)
Renton, David


du Cann, Edward
Johnson Smith, Geoffrey
Ridley, Hon. Nicholas




Ridsdale, Julian
Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)
Vane, W. M. F.


Robinson, Rt. Hn. Sir. R. (B'pool, S.)
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm
Vickers, Miss Joan


Roots, William
Studholme, Sir Henry
Wakefield, Edward (Derbyshire, W.)


Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard
Summers, Sir Spencer (Aylesbury)
Walder, David


Russell, Ronald
Talbot, John E.
Ward, Dame Irene


Sandys, Rt. Hon. Duncan
Tapsell, Peter
Whitelaw, William


Scott-Hopkins, James
Taylor, Frank (M'ch'st'r, Moss Side)
Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)


Sharples, Richard
Teeling, Sir William
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Shepherd, William
Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret
Wise, A. R.


Skeet, T. H. H.
Thomas, Leslie (Canterbury)
Woodnutt, Mark


Smith Dudley (Br'ntf'd &amp; Chiswick
Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)
Woollam, John


Smithers, Peter
Thompson, Richard (Croydon, S.)
Worsley, Marcus


Spearman, Sir Alexander
Thorneycroft, Rt. Hon. Peter



Speir, Rupert
Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Stanley, Hon. Richard
Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon
Mr. Chichester-Clark and


Stevens Geoffrey
van Straubenzee, W. R.
Mr. Gordon Campbell.




NOES


Ainsley, William
Hart, Mrs. Judith
Parker, John


Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)
Hayman, F. H.
Peart, Frederick


Beaney, Alan
Herbison, Miss Margaret
Proctor, W. T.


Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)
Holman, Percy
Randall, Harry


Blackburn, F.
Holt, Arthur
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Blyton, William
Houghton, Douglas
Robertson, John (Paisley)


Bowden, Rt. Hn. H. W. (Leics, S. W.)
Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)
Ross, William


Brockway, A. Fenner
Hunter, A. E.
Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)


Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)
Janner, Sir Barnett
Skeffington, Arthur


Callaghan, James
Jeger, George
Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)


Chapman, Donald
Jones, Elwyn (West Ham, S.)
Snow, Julian


Corbet, Mrs. Freda
Kelley, Richard
Sorensen, R. W.


Davies, Harold (Leek)
Kenyon, Clifford
Stonehouse, John


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
King, Dr. Horace
Stones, William


Deer, George
Lawson, George
Strachey, Rt. Hon. John


Dempsey, James
Lee, Frederick (Newton)
Stross, Dr. Barnett (Stoke-on-Trent, C.)


Dodds, Norman
Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)
Symonds, J. B.


Driberg, Tom
Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)
Thompson, Dr. Alan (Dunfermline)


Ede, Rt. Hon. C.
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson
Thomson, G. M. (Dundee, E.)


Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
McInnes, James
Tomney, Frank


Evans, Albert
McKay, John (Wallsend)
Ungoed-Thomas, Sir Lynn


Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)
McLeavy, Frank
Wainwright, Edwin


Forman, J. C.
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)
Warbey, William


Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Weitzman, David


Galpern, Sir Myer
Mitchison, G. R.
White, Mrs. Eirene


Ginsburg, David
Moody, A. S.
Whitlock, William


Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.
Morris, John
Willey, Frederick


Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
Moyle, Arthur
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Griffiths, W. (Exchange)
Mulley, Frederick
Willis, E. C. (Edinburgh, E.)


Grimond, Rt. Hon. J.
Noel-Baker, Rt. Hn. Philip (Derby, S.)
Winterbottom, R. E.


Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)
Oram, A. E.



Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley)
Paget, R. T.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Hamilton, William (West Fife)
Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)
Mr. Charles A. Howell and


Hannan, William
Pargiter, G. A.
Mr. Redhead.

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Bill, reported with an Amendment.

8.0 p.m.

Mr. E. G. Willis: On a point of order. I could not hear the business which is being conducted.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir William Anstruther-Gray): The business was clearly conducted. I heard What was said to me and I do not think it is necessary to repeat the well-known formula with which the House is acquainted.

Mr. Willis: Surely it is for hon. Members to hear the business. It is not a kind of conversation conducted at the

far end of the House. We here certainly did not hear what was being said.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: If it please the House to hear what happened, so be it.

Mr. Michael Hughes-Young (Lord Commissioner of the Treasury): I beg to report that the Committee has gone through the Bill and made a further Amendment thereto.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: That is quite clear. Bill to be considered, when?

Mr. Hughes-Young: Now, Mr. Deputy-Speaker.

Bill, as amended (in Standing Committee, and on recommittal), considered.

New Clause.—(STANDING ADVISORY COUNCIL.)

(1) There shall be a Standing Advisory Council on awards and grants to students and it shall be the duty of the Council to advise the Minister upon such matters connected with such awards and grants as they think fit and upon any questions (including questions affecting applications for awards and grants) referred to them by him.

(2) The members of the Council shall be appointed by the Minister and the Minister shall appoint a member to be chairman thereof.

(3) Without prejudice to the foregoing provisions, where the Minister proposes to make any regulations under this Act he (unless it appears to him to be inexpedient to do so having regard to the urgency of the matter) shall refer the proposals in the form of draft regulations to the Council for their consideration and advice.—[Mr. Willey.]

Brought up and read the First time.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think that it would be convenient to debate also with this Clause the proposed new Clause "Standing Advisory Council for Scotland".

Mr. Willey: I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
We know that there is already, in anticipation of the Bill becoming an Act, Sir Francis Hill's Committee, which deals with questions affecting grants under the Bill, but we feel that that Committee ought to be recognised in the Bill itself and it is for that purpose that we move the new Clause.
When we raised this matter in Standing Committee we proposed that there should be provision for membership of the Committee, and the Parliamentary Secretary will remember that he thought that this would place an undesirable restriction on his right hon. Friend. In the new Clause, therefore, we do not make any proposal about people sitting on the Committee in a representative capacity. On the other hand, we bring into the Clause a provision which we did not suggest in a new Clause in Standing Commitee and it is one of considerable importance.
This is the requirement that appeal machinery should provide for representations being made to the advisory council. We were assured during earlier discussions that through bringing into effect for the purposes of the Bill the provisions of the Education Act, 1944, the Minister himself would be able to provide for hearing representations from

applicants who for one reason or another feel aggrieved about the awards made. We feel that it would be much better for everyone concerned if such appeals could be referred to this council. On reflection, I think that the right hon. Gentleman would accept that this would be a better way of dealing with representations from applicants for awards.
The other matter of some importance is that we provide that the duty should be imposed on the Minister to refer regulations in draft to the council. This, again, is a useful provision and it is useful to recognise this in the Statute itself. We realise that Sir Francis Hill's Committee is, in effect, doing this. It is receiving representations and, no doubt, will advise the Minister about regulations which, eventually, he will bring before us for consideration. But, as has been done in similar cases in previous legislation, we feel that it would be advisable to make provision statutorily for reference in draft form of such regulations to such a council as this.
These are the two considerations which have lead us to propose the inclusion of the council in the Statute itself and that it should not be left merely to the good offices of the Minister to provide for the constitution of such a council, as he has done. When we discussed this in Committee the Parliamentary Secretary's reply was that there were two categories of committees. We bear no critical ill-will towards the Department. We realise that a Department largely relies on the advice of statutorily formed and ad hoc committees. This is not a Department that has any allergy towards committees. The Parliamentary Secretary distinguishes the two categories of committees, and one deals with long-term matters of high educational policies. Those are the committees which should be statutorily recognised and should depend upon Statutes for their creation.
The hon. Gentleman said that there are also lesser and more administrative types of problems which are dealt with by ad hoc committees set up by the Minister. If we have special committees for these two categories, it is important to recognise that the Hill Committee falls into the first category. It is being asked to advise about matters which go


wider than the lesser and administrative types of problem.
The Minister will recognise, in the light of discussion on this Bill, that some difficult and broad problems may arise. It would be as well not only to have them referred to an advisory council, but for that council itself to feel that it had been created by Statute. I hope that, on reconsidering the matter, the right hon. Gentleman will agree that it would be better to make such provision in the Bill, and that he will, therefore, accept the new Clause.

Mr. Hannan: The House will accept that I am mainly concerned with the Clause which would establish an advisory council for Scotland. Before I start, however, perhaps I should draw your attention, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, to the fact that among the names of the hon. Members listed as sponsoring the Clause dealing with an advisory council for Scotland there is that of "Mr. Walter Hannan". I know of no such hon. Member. I presume that that is myself and that I shall still be in order in referring to the Clause.

This proposal stems from a recommendation of the Anderson Report, in paragraph 277, which said:
In England and Wales, the need for consultation among those concerned has been acknowledged…

It recommended that a standing advisory committee should be appointed to consider
…all details of policy which come under review and to advise the Ministers on the decisions to be taken on them.

Later on, the Report said:
The same Committee should cover Scotland as well as England and Wales, with, if necessary, separate sub-committees for each country for certain purposes. We recommend that this committee should also have the function of advising the Ministers on problems…

It seems to me, however, that the latter part of that paragraph gives a reason against having one council by saying:
As central policy decisions clearly cannot cover every conceivable circumstance…

For reasons I shall later point out, the Report states the difficulties and says
This is why we think it desirable that the Standing Advisory Committee should not only advise on policy but also be available for consultation…

If there is such a national advisory council, with separate sub-committees, some of us doubt whether that arrangement will be efficient and in the best interests of Scottish education. If there is one Scottish service which is different from that of England and Wales, it is education. That is one of the reasons why my hon. Friends and I put down the new Clause calling for a separate advisory council for Scotland.

8.15 p.m.

Paragraph 7 of the Anderson Report gives added weight to the call for a separate council for Scotland by saying:
There are marked differences between the two educational systems. Perhaps the crucial difference, from our point of view, is that in England and Wales the G.C.E. 'A' level examination is normally taken at about 18, whereas the Scottish Leaving Certificate examination is normally taken at about 17:

Then it says:
But there are other significant differences.

Later still it says, after referring to Scottish universities:
This is quite unlike England and Wales, where the two ancient universities of Oxford and Cambridge still have a greater attraction for many students than the modern universities. Again, higher education outside the universities has developed differently.

These are all reasons for having a separate council for Scotland. The Anderson Report points out the distinctions between Scotland and England and Wales in education. We do not dissent from our hon. Friends on the principle and necessity for an advisory council, but there are aspects which are worthy of consideration by a separate standing advisory council for Scotland, especially in view of the fact that, following our earlier discussions, I am still in doubt as to the alteration effected in Clause 6, which referred, in turn, to
Paragraph (10) of section seventy of the Scottish Act of 1946…

There is sufficient difference between the two systems to justify a separate council for Scotland.

Sir D. Eccles: The hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) quoted from paragraph 277 of the Anderson Report. In that paragraph, we were recommended to have one advisory council for England and Wales and Scotland. I know, as he said, that there have been differences, and some quite important differences, between the two systems in higher education, but I


thought that it was the general view of the House that these differences in regard to grants ought to cease, and that it would be to the advantage of the students of the United Kingdom that the basis on which grants are paid should be the same for the whole country.
Therefore, the recommendation in the Anderson Report that we should have one advisory council seemed to us very sensible and likely to be very much welcomed by the student body of the country. There may be some particular circumstances in connection with Scottish universities which are different from English and Welsh universities. If so, it would be easy for the advisory council to have a special sub-committee to deal with them.
I put it to the House that the most important thing is that our young men and women going to universities anywhere in the United Kingdom should have grants on the same basis. Therefore, we have put a strong representation from Scotland on the advisory council. I believe that that is the best arrangement for the students themselves.
The Minister for Science also has an interest. He has put his nominees on the Hill Committee because the awards given through the D.S.I.R. for postgraduate studentships should be looked at in relation to awards given by Ministers of Education.
Two questions are raised by the new Clauses. The first is whether this council ought to be statutory. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) told us that the Parliamentary Secretary had held that there were two kinds of advisory council, one statutory and the other not. He said that this body ought to fall into the first category, but I doubt that.
In my own Ministry we have a statutory council, the Central Advisory Council for Education for England, and a similar body for Wales. These councils are meant to deal with long-term fundamental issues of education policy. They produced the Crowther Report and are now studying the education of children between the ages of 13 and 16. That is a long-term survey and we reckon that it will be two years before we get the Report, which will be of great value in the formation of education policy.
On the other hand, we have a number-of advisory committees which are not statutory, for instance, the Committee on the Training and Supply of Teachers which does a great deal of work. Then there is the Committee on Education for Industry and Commerce, on which I rely for a great deal of advice on those subjects. There is also the Youth Service Development Council. None of these is a statutory body and it appears to us that the new Advisory Council for Grants is on all fours with them.
As the Anderson Report advised in paragraph 277:
…we recommend that a Standing Advisory Committee be appointed to consider all details of policy which come under review and to advise the Ministers on the decisions to be taken on them.
There are many details of policy and it is for just those that we want an ordinary committee. It is not long-term policy which we are asking from this Council, but advice on how to carry out the objects of the Bill.
The second proposal in the new Clauses is that the Minister should be bound to refer his proposed regulations to the council except in cases of great emergency. The Minister does not have that obligation with the other advisory councils which help the Education Departments. But, of course, we show draft circulars and Regulations and so on not only to the advisory councils, but to all the bodies concerned. That is a matter of courteous behaviour, but it is not a duty. The system has worked well in other parts of the education service and I do not think that it would be at all wise to make it obligatory on the Minister.
Perhaps I can explain why I think that. Subsection (3) of the new Clause says:
…where the Minister proposes to make any regulations under this Act he (unless it appears to him to be inexpedient to do so having regard to the urgency of the matter) shall refer the proposals in the form of draft regulations to the Council for their consideration and advice.
But a great part of the Regulations under the Bill will have nothing to do with the council, and nor will many of the Regulations made by the Secretary of State in relation to education in Scotland. For example, under Clause 1 the Minister will have to make Regulations resting on decisions of general


policy—for instance, what is to be the qualification for an automatic award. This has nothing to do with the council although it is a big question. Whether it shall be two A levels or not is a matter on which the Minister himself must decide in the light of what he considers to be the best qualifications for the time being.
There are also Regulations which will provide for the exclusion of certain classes of students, perhaps those who have already taken a degree course and those coming from abroad solely in order to obtain higher education. These are matters of policy on which the Minister must decide and they cannot be handed over to an advisory council. Then there is the series of Regulations under Clause 3 which will lay down the general rules of eligibility to compete for mature State scholarships and State studentships.
These are all things which must be reserved to the Department and I am sure that we should get on better if we treated this council as we treat all the other advisory councils, that is to say, from time to time Education Ministers will refer to it matters on which we should like advice. We shall build up excellent relations with the council, as we have with the others, but it would not be wise for us to have to take the council's advice on all matters arising under the Bill for which Regulations are needed.
I hope that the House will agree that it is a good thing that the conditions for Scottish grants should be the same as those for the English and Welsh and, therefore, that it is a good thing to have one council, but with sub-committees to deal with anything peculiar to one side of the Border. I very much hope that hon. Members will not ask for the council to be statutory as that would be out of line with the other councils which we now have, one lot statutory and the other not. It would not be wise, even if the council were statutory, to put before it every Regulation which it is necessary for my right hon Friend the Secretary of State or myself to make

8.30 p.m.

Sir Myer Galpern: I have listened carefully to the right hon. Gentleman and I now begin to wonder precisely what the duties of

this council, whether it is statutory or otherwise, will be. The very subjects which the Minister has enumerated are exactly those which I would have thought would be matters of immediate concern to an advisory body. The difficulties are precisely the delineation between the individual who applies for an award for one course which is conceded and the individual who is refused an award for another course. This body with expert representatives from the D.S.I.R. and similar organisations is exactly the body to make such decisions.
The Minister referred to the existing Advisory Councils on Education for Scotland and England and Wales and correctly drew a clear distinction between the duties of those bodies and those which would fall upon that suggested. One has to deal with long-term policy unfolding in the years ahead—if there ever are any changes, for we still have a provision in the 1944 Act whose implementation would give an entirely new look to education.
This new body would have to deal with rapidly changing financial circumstances. It ought to be able to suggest new figures for grants in the light of increases in the cost of living and other changing conditions. It would have to make regulations speedily and would not in any way be dealing with long-term policy. It therefore ought to be a body with a distinct standing, which it would have were it elevated to the status of a statutory council.
The Minister has created a great deal of disarray in my mind. He says that even if this body is not a statutory one he cannot possibly agree to it being in the privileged position of receiving advance notice of any draft regulations which he may propose to introduce. This is just the kind of body to which draft regulations ought to be submitted, except possibly on occasions when, because of the urgency of the situation, it is not possible to do so.
If draft regulations were submitted to such a body, they could be carefully scrutinised, and the council could then decide whether the Minister's proposals were educationally wise or unwise; whether financial sums involved were adequate or not. Such a council could make recommendations in the hundred and one difficult cases that are bound to arise.
Let me give one example. There is a college of piping in Glasgow. One student applied for a grant to enable him to study at this college. As it is essential that piping should not become something of a lost art in Scotland, he was awarded a grant. Applications of that type can be multiplied a hundred, or a thousand times, and apparently it is to be left to the Minister to decide whether this type of application should qualify for a grant. I submit that this is just the type of problem which the proposed council should consider.
The Minister talked about deciding whether two A levels, or four "Highers" as it would be in Scotland, would be a prerequisite for even entertaining an application for a grant for further education. I submit that matters such as this ought to be within the province of this advisory council. It should be staffed by experts, and it should be left to the council to decide whether a person's qualification were such as to justify recommending an award to enable him to pursue a higher course of study. I do not think that the Minister should take this power unto himself. He should, on every occasion, seek the advice of this council.
I hope that, on reflection, the Minister will come to the conclusion that in respect of the matters on which he proposes to be the final arbiter this council ought to be his mentor and say whether grants should be awarded to certain individuals, and, if so, the amount of grant that should be awarded.
I have had experience of dealing with applications from people who have asked to be allowed to pursue all sorts of ideas. The ideas put forward for further study were legion. Some were more fanciful than others, but, in any case, the decision whether an award should be made should be left to the council and not to the Minister of Education or the Secretary of State for Scotland. I hope that the Minister will accept the new Clause,

Mr. William Ross: I find it surprising that the Minister should have taken up this attitude. I gathered from what we have heard today that he was in a mood amenable to reason. I thought that he would have jumped at this opportunity of giving pleasure to my hon. Friends and of earning their

gratitude in respect of the suggestions which they have made and the interest which they have shown in this important Bill.
That is where we start—it is an important Bill. We are more or less making a new start in many respects. When we have a suggestion from the Anderson Committee that we should have a statutory council, I do not think it is good enough for the right hon. Gentleman to say, in effect, "I cannot agree to this because I have to make decisions. That is a matter for the Minister and not for the Council."
I shall not deal at the moment with the suggestion for separate councils because, in view of the attitude which the Minister has taken up, that pales into insignificance compared with the main point. Should we have a statutory council? Are the Minister's reasons valid? I sort of leap away every time someone mentions advisory councils. I have been a member of too many advisory councils. The Parliamentary Secretary will appreciate that I am still a member of the Post Office Advisory Council.

Mr. K. Thompson: Does the hon. Gentleman ever attend it?

Mr. Ross: I attend as often as I am called, and it has not been called for the past year. We have had one meeting with the present Minister since he became Postmaster-General and that was just to let us have a look at him.

Mr. Willis: No wonder there was nearly a strike.

Mr. Ross: I have a working knowledge of another advisory council which, to my mind, the House has found invaluable and which the Minister himself, I am sure, would not be without. That is the Ministry of Pensions Advisory Council. It is a statutory body to which the Minister has to refer just the kind of things that the Minister of Education says we cannot send to this proposed council because they are matters of policy, and he has to make decisions about them.

On the question of the earnings rule as applied to widows' pensions, before the Minister lays a regulation to make any change he has to submit it to the Advisory Council. In fact, he has found


that that Advisory Council is so important that without the need of any regulations at all he has gone to it when he has been pressed in the House to do something about widows' pensions. He has said, "I will submit this to the Advisory Council." Armed with the report and the objective consideration of a problem by people who are not tied up in the hurly-burly of politics, he has been able much more easily to satisfy the House of Commons on what he has decided to do.

Let us remember that we do not say in the new Clause that the Minister has to take the advice of the proposed council. The power of decision can never be taken away from a Minister; it is still his. But surely it is right that with a council of this status and standing, which, to my mind, it can get only by being written into the Statute, and given duties and powers—and not a council that can be fobbed off as in the case of the Post Office Advisory Council—he would be able to get the right kind of person, the right kind of advice and still be left with the power of decision. I wonder how often the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance has welcomed the assistance of his Ministry's Advisory Council and how much parliamentary time it has saved.

I hope that the Minister of Education will think again. He made one slight mistake about this. He started by saying that we could not have two separate committees because this is all one problem, but, whether he likes it or not, there are two Ministers, so the power of decision is not wholly his. The power of decision is both his and that of the Secretary of State for Scotland. In such a situation there may well be a further argument for having only one council to consider the way in which the question affects both countries and both systems. In that case, it would tend to prevent disputes arising between the two Ministers. If the right hon. Gentleman is determined to have one council, I suggest that it is important that it should be made a statutory body, and should be able to deal with such matters as regulations.

Mr. William Ainsley: All hon. Members must realise that the Bill makes a fundamental change in the system of awards and grants to students. Some awards

are obligatory upon local authorities and others are permissive, and we must take into consideration not only the general grant but also the obligatory awards. In that respect I can foresee difficulties for local authorities, and I consider it essential that an advisory council should be set up to work in conjunction with local authorities and to have consultations with the Minister—not with a view to taking away his power and authority but to advise him on the question of awards, both obligatory and permissive.
Our opinion is that, with the new structure to be created under the general grant system, the setting up of an advisory council is the best way to get some semblance of the uniformity which local authorities have tried to bring about in the past, in consultation with the Minister. Some authorities have been over-generous and some have been less generous than they should have been, and the Minister has been trying to maintain an average level. An advisory council would be able to keep in close contact with the various local education authorities and would be able to advise the Minister in cases where it felt that he should urge a local authority to come up to the national average.
Many advisory committees have been set up in the past, but they have dealt with various subjects. Many years ago I had the pleasure of being a member of a committee concerned with industry and commerce. That committee advised the Minister. The proposed council would deal with the specific problem of the various social and economic aspects of education as they affect young people.
It is in the interests of the Minister that such an advisory council should be established, and we plead with him to give our suggestion further consideration. It would not take away any of his powers, but it would help in the administration of our educational service.

8.45 p.m.

Mrs. White: The main arguments on our proposals have been put very eloquently by my hon. Friends who have spoken in this debate. I ask the Minister to think again about this and to cast his mind back to the experience he has had in other Departments. He has been


putting forward what happens to be the practice in his present Department.
The point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) should be closely considered. The members of these committees act in a voluntary capacity. They are asked to give public service. If they are treated—I would not say as of no account—as of only limited account and are not given specific duties and obligations by Statute, such committees can easily wither away. They start off with a great burst of energy such as that shown by Sir Francis Hill's Committee at the moment. For the first year or two they are keen and interested, but then the Department gets tired of them. Realising that it is under no obligation, it asks why it should refer matters to a committee. Then fewer and fewer things are referred to the committee, and no one of any substance, except possibly the chairman who has some position of authority, wishes to serve on such a committee.
I ask the Minister to think about this matter more carefully. If he has certain obligations to refer matters to the council—not for final decision; we all appreciate that the final decision must of course be his—and the council is under an obligation to consider those matters, that will keep the council healthy and alive. I have had experience, as many hon. Members have had, on different types of advisory committee. I have recently refused to serve on one connected with the Ministry of Labour. I did so because I felt that it was a "fifth wheel of the coach". Its advice is not heeded and it does nothing worth while. Simply to go there for an interesting conversation and a cup of tea every few months did not seem worth doing. There was no obligation on the Minister in regard to that committee and the civil servants had to scratch around to find something to put to it.
On the other hand, there is another body with which the Minister is familiar because of an earlier position he held, the Cinematograph Films Council of the Board of Trade. I have served on that for a number of years. The Minister concerned is under an obligation to refer to that body. It does a considerable amount of very detailed work which saves the Department a great deal of

difficulty. It is in the hands of experienced people whose advice carries great weight. That is the type of council we ought to have for this matter of students grants.
If we do not have this kind of relationship, I cannot help feeling that in due course things will be far less satisfactory than they may appear to be at the outset. I have been on the other side in this matter. I was once a civil servant and I know exactly how one can manipulate an advisory committee. I wish to ask the Minister several questions. If he does not propose to accept our suggestion as to what the nature of the advisory council is to be, what means are we to have of knowing what it has recommended? What means are the universities or student bodies to have of knowing what the recommendations of the council are? Is it to publish reports? Is it to be free to publish reports or will it be at the discretion of the Minister whether any information is divulged?
It has been suggested that at present there is a great deal of confusion about where the Ministry ends and the Committee begins. We suggest that the council should act in effect as an appeal tribunal. I understand that at the moment individual cases are referred to the committee by the Ministry, but not all those cases. If application is made to the Minister suggesting that an award should have been granted or that a better award should have been granted, details may or may not be referred to the committee. No one knows what gets through the sieve. There is no right of direct access to the committee. All this goes on through the Department which, in its wisdom, decides what should be referred to the committee and what should not be referred. Our suggestion is that the Minister should have a statutory duty to ask the council for advice. Whether he takes that advice or not is his responsibility if he is to lay Regulations.
It should also be considered as an appeal tribunal. We have two different arrangements between England and Scotland as to the responsibility of the central authority to make awards. Nevertheless, there are bound to be cases in both countries in which some kind of appeal may be considered desirable. At


present, as I understand it, the Minister relies on his general powers to suggest to local authorities what they should do if he thinks that they are acting unreasonably in any particular case. It seems to us that it would be more satisfactory if greater power were given to this council to investigate and advise the Minister, because he would then be making use of the experience of the people who sit on the council.
We have all been thoroughly depressed by what the Minister said about the matters which he does not propose to refer to his committee. It seems to us that precisely the matters which he mentioned—qualifications for automatic awards, the exclusion of certain classes of students and mature scholars—are exactly the sort of things on which the advice of such a body should be sought. If all that they are to be asked to deal with are such questions as whether they should allow an extra half-crown in calculating students' grants because laundry charges have gone up, I do not think that busy people will continue to serve on a body of that kind, if all the matters of substance are to be kept from it, and it is expected to do a kind of domestic arithmetic on behalf of the Minister.
The Minister's reply was most disappointing. I still hope that he will think a little more broadly about this matter. We have all had experience, one way or another, of advisory committees in Ministries, and we think that there is real value in laying down specific duties to be referred to such a committee, if it is to continue in a healthy and helpful frame of mind.

Sir D. Eccles: With the permission of the House, I should like to say one or two things in reply to the debate. The hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) asked what the Committee is to do. Its first job is to look at the level of grants, and it is now doing that. It is having a very great deal of advice from all kinds of bodies and going into all the arguments for and against the present level of grants for the different sections of the grants and different kinds of students. There is a big job to be done in defining comparable courses, because that will govern the kind of grant to be given to a student taking a particular course. It will do that. I

would not at all rule out asking the Committee's advice on a general change in qualifications. I think that would come within its competence, but I should not think it right to ask the Committee questions such as the exclusion of particular categories of students from automatic awards. I think that is something better settled in the Ministry.

Miss Herbison: Not one of my hon. Friends has asked that the advisory council should settle anything. On the very last point which the Minister has made, surely the advisory council might be able to consider it better than the Minister? Ail that we are asking is that it should give the Minister advice, but leave the settling of the details in the hands of the Minister.

Sir D. Eccles: There are certain things on which the advisory council would not be able to give better advice. These are very eminent, academic gentlemen—and three women—on the Committee, and they are going to have a great deal of work to do giving me advice on the large issue of comparable courses and grants. It is necessary that they should do first things first. As we go on there may be other matters which I and my right hon. Friend may wish to refer to them. The hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) made a mistake when he said that the Anderson Committee recommended a statutory council. In fact, it recommended a standing advisory council.
he hon. Lady the Member for Flint, East (Mrs. White) asked whether we should publish the Committee's reports. The Chairman of the Committee has asked me to talk to him about the question of publishing his reports, and I am just about to do so.
Should the Committee be an appeal tribunal? Where a would-be student or a student writes and says that the local authority has been very unreasonable in not making him a grant, this is looked into in the Department, and it may be that we can settle that case at once. It may be that the local authority is willing to change its mind or that we can adduce new evidence, in which case it is not worth putting the question to these very busy people who have so much to do. But there may be borderline cases which involve a certain amount of principle, and in those cases, I think, it is


useful to refer them to the Committee. What the student wants is a quick decision, and it is our business to get a quick decision on these appeals in the best way that we can.
I am at one with those who said that it is important to have an advisory committee and that it should be one which we trust and to Whose work we should keep giving momentum. The advisory councils inside the ambit of the Ministry of Education are very lively bodies. I see none of them which is failing because the Minister does not want to have them troubling him.

Sir M. Galpern: But he does not accept their advice.

Sir D. Eccles: Whether a Minister acts on their advice appears to me to have nothing to do with Whether the Committee is statutory. The Crowther Committee was statutory, and it gave me some advice on which, I regret to say, I have not been able to act. I do not think that the Minister's assent is affected by considerations of the nature of the Committee.
I give the House an undertaking that we shall consult the Hill Committtee on every possible occasion. We very much look forward to the result of the work which it is doing, which is to bring uniformity into the awards throughout the length and breadth of the United Kingdom.

Question put and negatived.

Clause 5.—(AMENDMENT OF S. 43 OF SCOTTISH ACT OF 1946.)

9.0 p.m.

Miss Herbison: I beg to move, in page 6, line 17, to leave out paragraph (b).
This paragraph reads:
the fees and expenses payable in respect of persons attending schools at which fees are payable; 
Earlier in the Clause we find that the Secretary of State is taking powers
for the purpose of defraying in whole or in part
these fees. This is not new in legislation. This provision has been with us for a considerable time.
We have tabled the Amendment to have some questions answered? What

is the extent of this provision? What is the annual cost to the Scottish Education Department? How many young people are involved? From what type of home do these children come? It is important that we should have this information. When a decision is being made by the Scottish Education Department on whether or not to give parents this financial help for their child, is the same income level taken into account as is taken into account for the bursaries for those children who remain at school after the age of 15? Are any other factors taken into account when this decision is made?
I have an idea that these provisions are designed to help a mother who has been suddenly widowed. I support that intention. I also understand that these provisions are used to help parents, who are very often abroad doing work for the country, to make proper provision for the education of their children, particularly when, whether they like it or not, they must send their children home to this country to be educated.
If the child is coming from abroad, and has to go to a boarding school, what part of the child's maintenance fees at the boarding school is met by the Department of Education? These children not only have to come here. Very often their parents get leave only about once in three years. None of us who has any feeling for education and for the well-being of children would want a child to be away from its parents for three years. We should want the child, particularly during the long holiday, to be able to join his parents wherever they are. That is a costly business.
I want to know the exact extent of this provision. What is being spent on it annually? What income level is taken into account? Finally, are we sure that in every case this is being used for the purpose for which it was intended and not to subsidise in some instances education which ought not to be subsidised?

Mr. Brooman-White: I think that I can clarify the situation quite briefly. As the hon. Lady the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) said, this is a long-standing provision. The numbers vary from year to year. There are about 100 to 200. The annual cost is about£25,000. I have no information


as to the type of family from which the children are drawn. I cannot be specific about that.
The hon. Lady was quite right in her tacit assumption about the object of the Clause. These bursaries are to enable local authorities to help families where a sudden bereavement may cause hardship, for example a parent dying when a child is half-way through its school career. As we have no facilities for transferring these children to local authority schools in Scotland, it would be very difficult to make any other arrangement, and bursaries are used for that purpose. Equally, they are provided where the parents are overseas, or are sent overseas, as technicians or soldiers, or to other posts—

Mr. Ross: The Armed Forces themselves make provision for this.

Mr. Brooman-White: I thank the hon. Gentleman for correcting me in that generalisation. Let us say technicians, and the like type of case where full provision is not made. It is to that sort of use that this power has been put hitherto, and which we shall continue to make of it.

Miss Herbison: Must the parents have some residential qualification? That is important, since some may have difficulty in proving a residential qualification to a local authority. That is why I brought in the Department.

Mr. Brooman-White: I believe that by a minor Amendment to the previous Clause we have satisfactorily overcome difficulties that (have hitherto arisen in deciding which authority is responsible. I do not think that that difficulty will arise in future.

Mr. Willis: What types of schools are mainly referred to?

Mr. Brooman-White: The local authority has discretion to give assistance to children attending any fee-paying school in Scotland.

Mr. Willis: Will the hon. Gentleman be a little more explicit about the type of school? How are these 100 or 200 pupils divided between different types of schools in Scotland? It might be such schools such as the Merchant Company Schools in Edinburgh. The provision might even apply to Fettes, or Loretto, or Gordonstoun—or any school.

Mr. Brooman-White: With the permission of the House, I would say that the provision will hardly apply to local authority schools because, strictly speaking, there are no fee-paying schools of this type in Scotland. But consideration of the matter is not affected by whether a school is grant-aided or not. Any fee-paying school in Scotland can receive this sort of assistance.

Miss Herbison: As this was merely a probing Amendment, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 6.—(AMENDMENT OF S. 70 OF SCOTTISH ACT OF 1946.)

Mr. Hannan: I beg to move, in page 7, line 4, at the end to insert:
(2) It shall be the duty of the Secretary of State to include in the report which he lays before Parliament in accordance with the requirements of section 67 of the Education (Scotland) Act, 1946, a statement showing the number of awards made under the foregoing paragraph and the number of students who discontinued their studies in that year without completing the course in respect of which the award was made.
The purpose of this Amendment is to get more information from the Secretary of State so that we can judge the value of these bursaries, and find out what return Parliament, the nation and the taxpayer get for their money. The House will know that from time to time there appear in the Press statements by prominent men in the education world—and the matter has also been raised in the House—about the number of university students who have come down in their first year.
We cannot get this information, although one would expect that we should, from the university sources. They always assert their independence and none of us want to upset that assertion in respect of such things as their curricula. Nevertheless, my hon. Friends believe that there should be a greater amount of public accountability, through Ministers, as to what happens after students are granted awards and bursaries. For instance, what is the rate of wastage and the rate of production? Is it 2½per cent? What are the rules governing this?
Is it true that the wastage rate among first-year students is 15 per cent., 20 per cent., or 25 per cent.? How can we get this information? The Amendment seeks to ensure that the Secretary of State, in the annual report which he is bound to publish under Section 67 of the Act, will include a statement which will help us to better understand this subject. We will be able to know how many entrants have gone in in the current year, the figure for the following year and how many have come down in their first and second years, that is, of the same group going through.
We would, with this information, be able to get an idea of what further steps could be taken to meet the causes of the wastage of what is, after all, very real human material. In that way we could form better policies which would, in turn, ensure a better return for the moneys Parliament makes available.

Mr. Ross: I wish to make one or two comments, but I will gladly sit down if the Under-Secretary will say that he accepts the spirit of the Amendment.

Mr. Brooman-White: I am accepting the spirit, but not the letter, of the Amendment and perhaps the hon. Gentleman the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) will allow me to develop this a little further.
The annual report is published under the 1946 Act and, as is stated in the Amendment, Section 67 of that Act makes it mandatory on the Secretary of State to publish it. The fact that Clause 6 is an amendment to the earlier Act extends that obligation to cover university and further education awards for which the Secretary of State is now taking responsibility. The table at present published goes rather wider than the proposals of the Amendment. We give the number of awards current at any time during the year, the number of awards granted for the first time during the year, the number of awards held the previous year and the number terminated because of unsatisfactory conduct during the year. We also provide the number of awards included under the first heading but terminated during the year because of unsatisfactory progress.
We are prepared to give an undertaking that, in future, the annual reports will continue to give detailed information about that section of the further education award field which is now in the hands of the Secretary of State. I hope that with that assurance hon. Gentlemen opposite will not press their Amendment, which would specify a number of things, but will leave it open so that it may be varied in the light of experience or the views of the House.

Mr. Ross: The hon. Gentleman has given details of what is really the provision of only statistical information. I would have thought that my hon. Friends wanted more than that; that they required an inquiry into the causes of this wastage to see whether something cannot be done about it. We feel that this might affect schools in relation to the proportion of students in university.
It may be, as I suspect, that there is a measure of off-handedness in the treatment of first-year students by universities. We raised this matter with Sir Hector Hetherington when we visited the University of Glasgow, some time ago. The point is that we cannot afford to be indifferent about the number of failures in the first year. Perhaps more attention should be paid in that first year to the supervision of the actual teaching to ensure that students are properly guided along a road which must be new to them; to their lives in university. The first year at university, when students are so much on their own, is a complete break from the last year at school.
9.15 p.m.
That is what prompted our excellent Amendment. I hope that the Secretary of State will appreciate its importance from the point of view of Scotland and the need not to have careers blighted in the first year if anything can be done to prevent it. But we will not do anything to prevent it merely by recording statistics. We need to go further and to find out why the figures are so large and what can be done about them. We should like to be assured that the Scottish Education Department is looking at the matter in that light and will give us a report accordingly.
I remember a valuable paragraph in the report about why young people who


had decided to take five-year secondary courses were leaving at the age of 16 and some even sooner. There was a tremendous wastage. We had not only statistics, but a well-considered report, following research and inquiry into the causes. That is the kind of thing we want about the failures in the first year of university life. I hope that the Under-Secretary will go just that little bit further than he has done and meet the point made by my hon. Friend.

Miss Herbison: I support the Amendment. The Under-Secretary has drawn our attention to the report and the figures which it gives annually. He will be aware how often we have tried to get exact figures of wastage at university, particularly among first-year students. Under the Bill, the Secretary of State will be responsible for every award which is made to university students in Scotland. In other words, he will not have the difficulty of going to local authorities and finding out from them exactly how many grants are made and how many have to be stopped either for misconduct or for other reasons.
The Under-Secretary will be as aware as we are of the great worry that is caused by the number of people who go to universities, who have passed the hurdle of taking sufficient subjects or their higher standard or higher leaving certificate, and who fail so miserably in their first year at university. I realise that the Amendment might be restrictive. We are not asking for all the reasons to be given, but now that the Secretary of State will be getting reports back to the Scottish Department of Education rather than the reports going to every local authority, it would be much easier for him to give us in the yearly report the kind of information that we require. This might provide the answer to what is happening, not only in Scottish universities but in those in England. As a nation, we cannot afford this great wastage.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) has said, some of us on this side have discussed the matter with the Principal of Glasgow University and with some of his leading professors. We have our ideas on these matters and so, no doubt, have right hon. and hon. Members opposite. If, however, we can make a joint effort, the Minister giving in the report the kind

of information for which we ask and all of us, having got that information, trying to go further in finding out whether we can avoid the great wastage which occurs, this short debate will have served a useful purpose.

Mr. Ede: I want to support the spirit of the Amendment. It is probably needed more in England than it is in Scotland, because in Scotland, at any rate as reported to us mere English, there has been a tradition that every family of decent size expects to have at least one son at the university preparing for one of the learned professions, that is if one includes theology among learning. The new spirit in education in England is now getting into the universities a number of students every year who come from families which have never previously had a member at the university. It has been a matter of great pressure at school, in some cases probably unjustifiable pressure, to get a young person fit to sit the examination, and it is regarded as a great achievement when the examination is passed. It is quite wrong to have university education starting in that spirit.
Entrance to a university is not so much an achievement as an opportunity. The student released from the great pressure in the top forms of a secondary school suddenly finds an atmosphere in which nobody worries about what happens to him. I was talking the other day to a young friend of mine who was going up to Cambridge and I was warning him about this. I knew the college he was going to, the best in Cambridge I said, "You are going to read English literature. The reputation of your college in English literature does not depend on you. John Milton was there 300 years ago and you will be lucky in fifty years' time if somebody, in writing your biography, says, 'He well upheld the high literary reputation of his college.' You think that you will get into the college XI, but do not forget that Gilbert Jessop was in the college XI. If you play in the XI you will be very lucky if any reporter writing about you thinks that you worthily represent that tradition".
This is a strange atmosphere for a youth to enter from a family which has no university tradition. I do not want mere statistics, but we should have some


human report on the way in which universities in England and Scotland can get these youths into the university climate in a manner which stimulates them to further endeavour. In the world in which we are now living, to waste this fine potential through the non-human appreciation of youthful difficulties is a serious national loss.
I hope that in both countries we shall be able to obtain some information. If the spirit of the Amendment can be adopted in both countries it will enable us to secure a far higher return at the end of their university careers from the young people who enter upon them with so much hope. I do not want anyone to think that I am decrying universities or anyone else, but these youths occasionally end up as such a bitter disappointment to themselves, their families and the schools from which they came.

Sir Douglas Glover: I had not intended to join in the debate, but the Amendment is very important.

Mr. Ross: Keep on listening to the Scots. The hon. Gentleman is learning. He learnt last night, too.

Sir D. Glover: I should be out of order if I replied to the hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) and I do not want to get back to the Acts of Parliament Numbering and Citation Bill.
This is a very important matter. The right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) referred to students going to a college in Cambridge. I do not think that this problem arises as much in Oxford and Cambridge as in the redbrick universities. Even today there is a sufficient stream of life in the older universities to absorb a person more quickly.

Mr. Speaker: Order. These reflections are interesting, but I do not understand how they apply to the Scottish Statute with which this Clause is concerned.

Sir D. Glover: I was referring to what the right hon. Member for South Shields said, Mr. Speaker. There is a great wastage, at a time when we cannot afford it, of people going to university. It is a great problem. Some boys and girls who go to university may have worked very hard, but perhaps their parents are doubtful and do not give the encouragement

they should, saying that if they went out to work instead more money would come into the home.
A great deal more thought must be given to the problem of wastage, especially that which takes place in the first year at university. Whatever is done, we shall always have far too much wastage, but today the wastage is excessive. By further research and investigation, I am sure that much improvement could be brought about.

Mr. Brooman-White: This Amendment has opened up a very wide-ranging discussion of an extremely serious problem which is giving deep concern to all of us. I know that my right hon. Friend shares this concern, and we are trying to find out as much as we can about the causes of wastage so that we can do what we can to stop it, for we can ill afford it.
The discussion has gone a good deal beyond the immediate terms of the Amendment. All I should say in reply to the general points raised is that university wastage is a matter for consideration by the University Grants Committee, but that the question of higher education in Scotland as a whole comes under the terms of the inquiry being carried out by the Robbins Committee. The right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) and others have referred to the big adjustment which has to be made by school children moving up to university. We have had inquiries and reports, and hope that the practical steps we are taking, such as the introduction of the "A" certificate, will ease the transition and prevent some of these difficulties.
I can assure the House, without committing ourselves to what will be annually published in the report, other than statistics—which might not be a very suitable way of dealing with this matter—that we will continue to pursue every useful form of investigation into ways and means of preventing wastage and of making the best use of the ability of our children as they move up to university. We will continue as we have done hitherto to make reports of these investigations available to the House.

Miss Herbison: The hon. Gentleman said that this wastage at universities was a matter for the University Grants Committee, but surely it is more than that.


The Secretary of State is now to be responsible for the individual grants and, therefore, has a chance of finding out about these things. It seems to me that it is now as much the responsibility of the Secretary of State as of the University Grants Committee. I am sure that there is very little between us and I am sure that we shall achieve something.

Mr. Hannan: By leave of the House, I would like to say a word of appreciation for the Under-Secretary's reply, which was hopeful. I am also pleased that the Amendment has stimulated a wider interest in the principle which it raises.
At what point does the student cease to be the responsibility of the Secretary of State and become the responsibility of the university? Is there not an argument that for at least the first year of university studies the Secretary of State should be responsible and should give us some information about wastage? The House recognises that there is a secretiveness and a reluctance to give this vital information.
The Appleton Committee suggested as far back as 1955 that tutorial classes were the way out, on the lines of those at Cambridge and Oxford. But we do not have tutorial classes to help young people who are leaving school to get into the atmosphere of universities. It may come as a shock to some to learn that in Glasgow for some first-year students there are meetings of as many as 250 or 300 students. That is far from being education.
I know that I am in danger of getting out of order, so on the understanding that the Secretary of State will try to furnish as much information as he can, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

9.33 p.m.

Mr. K. Thompson: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
Throughout the proceedings on the Bill hon. Members on both sides of the House have shown themselves concerned that our education system should improve in line with the demands made upon it by the changing times in which we live. My right hon. Friend and I are grateful to hon. Members on both

sides of the House for the detailed consideration which they have given to the proposals in the Bill.
When, as I hope, the Bill has completed its passage through Parliament, two significant changes will have been made to affect the lives of pupils and students. The first is that the parents of students qualifying for and obtaining admission to most higher education institutes will find their financial obligations considerably relieved and more precisely defined. The second change made by the Bill is designed to secure that our secondary schools can provide a better organised final year for all those pupils who decide that they are going to leave as soon as they can.
It became very clear during our Committee proceedings that there existed a good deal of opinion that neither of the reforms we proposed went as far as it might. I do not think that my right hon. Friend seriously contests this point of view so far as it is advanced on exclusively educational grounds. However, we have to live in a world Where the reconciliation of different and often competing interests must inevitably condition our policies. In more homely language, we must cut our coat according to the cloth.
The improvements proposed for student grants represent an increased annual cost to central and local funds of about£10 million. The total of these grants in a full year will now amount to£45 million. This figure will grow as the universities grow, and as more students enter the teacher training colleges and colleges of advanced technology. The Government feel that to go further now would place an undue strain on the resources available.
The House cannot be unaware of the significance of this change at so considerable a cost at a time when the level of public expenditure on all services is being subjected to the closest scrutiny. The improvements that we have secured will bring welcome relief to many families, and I believe that they will be widely appreciated. Two out of five students will receive full grants, and their parents will be entirely exempt from contributions. Other parents will pay much less than before. A family with the one child at a university having


a scale income of£675 or less will contribute nothing, compared with£31 at the moment. A similar family with a scale income of£1,500 will be£71 a year better off, and so on.
Some hon. Members expressed disappointment that the arrangements require a continuation of the parental means test, with its implication of student dependence on family resources. I will not go over again all the arguments for and against these arrangements which have already engaged the attention of the House and the public Press for a long time. I draw the attention of the House to the fact that the Bill as it now leaves us does not preclude either a further improvement in the grants to be paid, or, if the time should be opportune and the case made out, for the abolition of the parental contribution altogether. I have no doubt that we will always be beset by the need to select priorities for further expenditure on education, and this case must sustain its claim to priority against what I am sure will be the pressing demands of other parts of the service.
The place of the teacher training colleges in the system of higher education is improving all the time. They grow in number and the standards to which they attain are being raised with the lengthening of the course and the provision of better facilities. My right hon. Friend will provide in his Regulations made under the Bill for the same level of awards as for university students. The basis upon which the training is provided and the arrangements for the maintenance of the students differ from the conditions under which university students are provided for, and Clause 2 (3) of the Bill takes account of this difference, but in every important respect the student at a training college ranks equally in esteem with his fellows in the universities.
The Bill establishes a pattern of automatic and uniform awards for students over a large part of the area of higher education. During our Committee discussions two points of difference emerged between hon. Members. It was argued that it was disagreeable to some local authorities that they should have imposed upon them an obligation to pay awards in conditions where they had no

discretion and of a level which they could not vary. The House will know that the form the Bill takes is the product of prolonged discussion and negotiations between the authorities and my right hon. Friend.
I will not claim that complete agreement was secured on every point, but such differences as remained at the end of the process are the legitimate residual differences not infrequently thrown up when matters of this kind are discussed. I ask the House to accept the view that the local education authorities have a special interest and concern in the progress and well being of the young people from their areas. This pastoral interest is in no way lessened because it is discharged under an obligation instead of by choice.
I was impressed by the frequency with which tribute was made in Committee to the faithfulness with which local authorities everywhere have carried out these duties in the past. But the House will also cherish the right of a local authority to retain and exercise other discretionary powers. Beyond the precise limit set in Clause 1, local authorities remain very largely masters in their own house, and I think that right. I do not share the view expressed by some hon. Members that these opportunities will be neglected or this discretion exercised perversely to the detriment of young people anxious to make their way in the world.
I was pressed during the Committee stage, and the point has been raised again in our debate this afternoon, to say precisely what powers remain to my right hon. Friend to correct an authority whose actions seem to be less helpful than might be appropriate in some circumstances. The Committee accepted an Amendment to the Bill as presented on Second Reading which makes it clear that the powers afforded to my right hon. Friend by the principal Act are embodied in this Measure. In these circum-stances, a complaint may be made to my right hon. Friend if it is thought that a local education authority has acted, or is proposing to act, unreasonably. We have had a good deal of experience of this process over the years, although the truth is that formal complaints are very few.
My flight hon. Friend's interpretation of this part of the principal Statute is not that his view should always prevail whenever he disagrees with a decision taken by a local authority. That would be a rigid centralised government of a kind that we have successfully avoided in the sphere of education. My right hon. Friend will consider representations made to him, will ascertain the reasons for the action complained of, and will discuss the remedy, if one is needed, with the local authority concerned. As with so many of our institutions and practices, the system has the merit of being effective, and I hope that the House will be persuaded that we have no reason to add yet further powers to those already at my right hon. Friend's disposal.
What I have been saying has been related directly to the Clauses which apply to England and Wales. The Bill also, of course, includes a number of Clauses, which we have now had the opportunity of discussing at greater length, affecting Scotland. Although they differ in form from the English Clauses, their effect is much the same as the provisions for England and Wales. For students taking courses of higher education, the object is to ensure that the level of awards shall be the same throughout Great Britain. This will remove a disadvantage which Scottish students have previously suffered, and gives them the opportunity they have long sought of freely attending the university of their choice.
The second of the main changes proposed in the Bill is in many ways no less important than the changes I have been discussing. Teachers and educational administrators have long regretted the arrangements which have resulted in the fourth year of the secondary schooling very often being spoiled for some children who leave before they have completed the course and disrupted for those who remain because of the frequent changes which these school leavers impose upon the school organisation.
The changes that we are proposing and the further steps advocated by hon. Members in Committee upstairs have been and are being increasingly anticipated by the children in our schools today. In thousands they are staying on beyond the age at which they would be free to leave under the present law, in

order to ensure for themselves the best that their schools can offer. I think that this is the most splendid symptom in our school society today. We must encourage and provide for it. That we are doing to the limit of our present resources. The problem posed by the proposal to compel all children to stay to the end of the fourth year is two-fold. My right hon. Friend has been advised by both sides of industry that there will be difficulty in arranging for the placing in suitable employment of all the school leavers at one time in the year, and the children whose experience would be the hardest would in most cases be those least able to bear the rebuffs and disappointments consequent upon having prolonged difficulty in getting a job.
The second aspect of the problem arises from what I said a moment ago. While many children choose to stay on, many still leave at the first opportunity, and some of these are very impatient indeed to be on their way. It is often argued that these are the very children to whom compulsion should be applied. It is also true, however, that these reluctant pupils are the most difficult to provide for. My right hon. Friend has asked me to record his admiration for many teachers in many schools for the careful and painstaking work they are doing with this type of pupil. This change even in its limited form cannot succeed unless we carry with us the support and understanding of the parents. I believe that parents will see this not as a prolonged obligation to leave the child at school but as an extended opportunity for their children to be prepared for the difficulties of working life outside.
Before we part with this Bill, may I end on a personal note? My first acquaintance with the administration of education was a good many years ago as a member of the Liverpool Education Committee. It has been a matter of no small pride to me to have had a part in the shaping of the Bill in its passage through this honourable House. I hope that its later stages will be as significant of the concern and good will which in these days support all education progress as it has been my pleasure to share during the past few months.

9.45 p.m.

Mr. Ede: I am sure that I speak for all who served on the Committee on the Bill, as well as for those who have


watched his performance today, in congratulating the Parliamentary Secretary upon the progress that he has made with the Bill, the courtesy he has shown, and his willingness to listen and then report to his Minister who, somehow or other, has not managed to give us all the concessions that we hoped for.
I also congratulate the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland. He sat in the Committee looking very wise and taking as little part as possible in the proceedings. I discovered today why he did so. It was because, in Clause 1, whereas the power of the Minister to make regulations is confined to universities and comparable institutions in the United Kingdom, the Secretary of State can provide for a Scottish child, out of money contributed in part by Englishmen, the opportunity to attend any educational institution in the world.
To that extent, I congratulate the hon. Member on having got the Clause through Committee without anybody having spotted it. It is a tremendous achievement, and I have no doubt that he was tremendously disappointed when, owing to the speech that I made, he had to remove any doubt about the matter this afternoon.
That represents a failure of the main purpose of the Bill, which is to secure equality of opportunity for every British child for whom the two education Departments are responsible. I hope that at an early date the Minister of Education will take steps to ensure that English and Welsh children have the same opportunities as Scottish children.
I welcome what the hon. Member said towards the close of his remarks. We have a great responsibility for providing for the non-academic child, and the longer we make his school life the heavier that responsibility will rest upon us. No person profits from education unless he is interested in the matter provided for him. The hon. Member said that he was drawn into education when he became a member of the Liverpool Education Committee. I found myself in educational administration at the age of 3½, as a pupil, and my sympathies have been with the underdog ever since.
In our schools we have to find the right approach to keep the non-academic

child interested in his school and in its curriculum throughout the whole of his time there. This is the work of the professional teacher. It is a difficult task, and few people are equipped by nature to do it. Most of us teachers, if asked why our results for a given year have not quite come up to standard, are apt to say, "Look who had them last year." The teacher's task is to teach, and he cannot teach unless he can interest the child.
One of the great opportunities now open for people as we extend school life is to find new methods of giving a child that sense of individuality for which he craves at school, and some sense of achievement at what he does there. The success of this Measure will depend upon the extent to which the teaching profession is able to give to the non-academic child a place in the school in which he can achieve those two personal wants—to get a sense of individuality, that he counts for something in the school, and a sense of achievement within the curriculum that is prepared for him.
I do not view the Bill with as much enthusiasm as I hoped to have done. I hoped we would be able to remove from it what still remains the means test on the parent. Any parent who is willing to keep his child in full-time education beyond the school-leaving age up to 18 and possibly beyond is presenting this country with so valuable an asset that the State ought to be willing to relieve him of the cost of keeping and educating that child. Those of us connected with this phase of the matter know that there are children in families of substantial income who resent having to be still regarded as expensive in spite of the alleviation of Income Tax and the rest and who are very often reluctant to undertake further education for which they are in every way fitted. That is a loss to the nation which we ought not to incur.
I do not think that the right hon. Gentleman differs from us on the principle. It was said of a great full-time Permanent Secretary to the Board of Education that he was not unprincipled, but he was unscrupulous. No one can say that the right hon. Gentleman is unprincipled in this matter, because I think that on every one of the topics I have raised at some time or other he


has expressed his wholehearted support of the principle, but not today. We are not quite sure when the accepted time will be, but I hope that whenever the opportunity occurs, if it comes during his period of office—and I am not supposed to be wishing him a long life in the office—he will seize the opportunity and enable us to apply the sound democratic principles that I know he holds in regard to education.
The greatest declaration of education policy was made in 1647 by the State of Massachusetts. It raised every one of the issues we have had in this Bill. This is the view that is sincerely held by every hon. Member on this side of the House as capable of immediate application. We could have hoped that the Measure before us would have got us further towards it.
The universal education of youth "—
declares the declaration of Massachusetts—
is essential to the well-being of the State; the obligation to furnish this education rests primarily upon the parent; the State has the right to enforce this obligation; the State may fix a standard which shall determine the kind of education and the minimum amount; a general tax may be levied, although school attendance is not general, to be used in providing such education as the State requires: education higher than the rudiments may be supplied by the State, and opportunity must be provided at public expense for youths who wish to be fitted for the University.
That was over 300 years ago. We have slowly moved towards it. Perhaps in the last twenty years we have moved rather faster than ever before. I hope that the acceleration will be continued and that before long there will be a broad highway of education in this country which is open to every child who is born into it.

9.55 p.m.

Mrs. White: I am sure that we are all delighted that my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) has taken part in the concluding stage of this Bill with a speech of his customary liveliness, wit, erudition and good sense.
When the Minister introduced the Bill on Second Reading, he claimed for it no more than that it provided some modest advances. In its progress through Committee, I am afraid that we have had very little added to those modest

advances. According to my calculations, we have had one correction and one concession. There was one correction about Northern Ireland, which has now been added to the scope of the Bill, and that was a matter of an error in drafting, and we have had a very slight concession indeed concerning mature students. Apart from that, the Bill is virtually unamended. This seems to me to be regrettable, because very strong arguments have been put forward during the Committee and Report stages on various matters, several of which the right hon. Gentleman might very well have conceded. However, that has not been done, and, therefore, we have to take the Bill as we now find it.
The Bill makes certain modest advances, and a very important one is that we are now to have automatic awards and uniformity of treatment of university students. Unfortunately, this does not extend to full-time students, as we urged, and we are left, as my right hon. Friend reminded us, with a parental means test. The Parliamentary Secretary pointed out that in future the parents of two out of five students will not suffer, but the other side of the coin is that the other three will. I beg the pardon of the hon. Gentleman if I have misunderstood him.

Mr. K. Thompson: They will pay no contributions. That is not a means test. It is simply to make sure that they qualify.

Mrs. White: They will pay no contributions, but I repeat that the converse is that the other three will. In other words, there will still be 60 per cent. of university students in this country whose parents will be liable, or rather will have the duty, to pay the contribution. Of course, whereas it will be mandatory upon the local authorities to make grants, it will not be mandatory on the parents, and this is one of the very great weaknesses of the Bill. We have always maintained that there is no method provided in the Bill for ensuring that parents meet their obligations.
We have had cases—there was one extreme case mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Dunfermline Burghs (Dr. A. Thompson) at Question Time today—in which parents were not


prepared to meet their obligations to their children, and we are told by the National Union of Students that a number of students did not obtain from their parents the amount of money which the parents, under the means test procedure, should be furnishing to them. Consequently, students get into debt and undertake more work in vacations than they should, from the point of view of their academic studies. I think it is a pity that we have not met this difficulty.
As I understand it, when a local education authority assesses parents, for example, for a boarding school which is at the expense of the authority, it can insist upon the parents paying the contribution which it has assessed. It seems a pity that we have not made certain that if we maintain a means test, as we do in the Bill, the students obtain from their parents what their parents are assessed to pay. We are not entirely happy with the Bill in this very important respect. We appreciate that there are financial circumstances which may have created difficulties but—

It being Ten o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Proceedings on the Education Bill exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of Standing Order No. 1 (Sittings of the House).—[Sir D. Eccles.]

EDUCATION (Recommitted) BILL

Question again proposed, That the Bill be now read the Third time.

Mrs. White: This is one instance mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields in which the Minister said that he was in entire agreement with the principle but found himself unable to carry out the Measure fully in practice. He referred to priorities and to school maintenance, but it is not as though he is doing anything extra about school maintenance.
Having made these criticisms, which I think are fully justified, I would add that we on this side of the House nevertheless welcome the advance which has been made. We are glad that after all these years the wide discrepancies between the treatment of students going to university from different parts of the

country will be eliminated, that they will know where they stand and that we shall remove from university students, but by no means from all students, the kind of discrimination which existed previously.
May I be allowed to say, in passing, that no reform of the grants system will be effective if there are insufficient places in the universities? This is not a direct responsibility of the Minister, but he must have been as much disturbed as were many of us to read last week the report of the Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals, which pointed out that in 1961 there were no fewer than 40,000 more applications for university places than there had been in the previous year. I refer not to applicants but to applications, for there were some multiple applications. On the other hand, the number of students admitted to first-degree courses increased by only 2,350 in the same period. Last October there were 22,650 admissions. It is clear that the pressure on universities is increasing substantially and that the reforms included in the Bill will to some extent be ineffective if we cannot obtain a far more rapid expansion in the number of university places.
Nevertheless, university students have reason to be grateful for the Bill. I wish that we could say as much for some other students. I do not wish to repeat the arguments adduced in Committee for suggesting that greater uniformity for other full-time students—I am not talking of part-time students—would have been very desirable.
I was much interested in the statements by the Parliamentary Secretary about teacher-training students. I do not know whether he was trying to repair some of the damage done by recent remarks by the Minister. I do not know whether the Minister is aware that there was considerable alarm and despondency among teacher-training college students following the remark which he made in our earlier proceedings on the Bill on21stFebruary. In his speech then the Minister referred to a line which had to be drawn between mandatory and discretionary awards. He said,
The principle of leaving the matter of full-time university students…in Clause 1"—


the students we have been discussing—
and leaving the matter of part-time students—there are very many kinds of part-time students—and the teacher-training student in the discretion of local authorities was a sensible division."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st February, 1962; Vol. 654, c. 458.]
I do not think that the right hon. Gentleman was fully aware of the impression his remark created. It appeared from his comment that he was putting university students on one side of the fence and teacher-training students, with a conglomeration of part-time students, on the other. Therefore, I am very glad that the Parliamentary Secretary came to his right hon. Friend's rescue. I hope that the remarks the Parliamentary Secretary made about teacher-training college students have made it clear that these students should be regarded as being of equal esteem with university students and should not have been put on a side of the fence which many of them—I have received representations about this—thought was derogatory.
There are several other matters which can arise on the question of awards, but I do not wish to detain the House too long, because the hour is growing late and several of my hon. Friends wish to speak. However, I do not think that I should leave the part of the Bill concerning awards without making a reference to Scotland. Those of us who previously were familiar with the education system of England and Wales only were very much interested in following the discussions on the practice in Scotland. We have discovered that in certain respects the Scots are much better served. The Secretary of State for Scotland has greater powers than the Minister in England and Wales for ensuring that some of the other students we have mentioned, not just university students, are treated adequately by way of grants.
I am aware that previously Scottish students coming to English universities were not so generously treated. This has now been put right. But in relation to certain other categories of students it appears to me that the Scottish system has much to commend it. One of the more enlightening parts of my duties on the Bill has been to study what is happening in Scotland. I only wish that there had been greater representation from our Scottish colleagues in the

Standing Committee, but they have made up for it in the later stages of the Bill.
The other part of the Bill, making a very peculiar partnership in the Bill, is the school-leaving date. We have discussed this at considerable length. We on this side have made it clear that we think that the Bill does not go far enough. We were very disappointed tonight at the attitude of the Minister on our Amendment. I am not speaking of the drafting. He may have been fully justified in his criticisms of the manner in which it was drafted, but we were deeply disappointed that he was not prepared to take powers to enable him to provide at some future date for one school-leaving date, which educationally, as he himself admits, is desirable. He has not yet pledged himself to any programme for raising the school-leaving age to 16. He should have allowed himself greater powers to use this alternative method if he is not to be able to announce very shortly a firm date for raising the school-leaving age to 16.
As far as it goes, the Bill is acceptable to us. In our view, it does not go so far is it should. We can only hope that, although we do not frequently have legislation dealing with education, it will not be too long before we have an opportunity of discussing another Education Bill.

10.10 p.m.

Dr. King: For the record, and in case what my hon. Friend the Member for Flint, East (Mrs. White) just now said was a little ambiguous, we had in the Standing Committee a Scottish Member who is one of the most distinguished educationists in the House. That he was not there to debate and discuss in detail the Scottish section of the Bill was due to the fact that he had volunteered to serve the House as one of its Chairmen—

Mrs. White: If my hon. Friend will permit me—I did correct the expression I used.

Dr. King: I just wanted to make it perfectly clear.
Some of us part with the Bill with regret—a regret not shared by the Minister and his advisers. Our regret is that we were unable, because of the


Government, to lick it into shape, but I, too, want to congratulate the Parliamentary Secretary on his skilful piloting of this Measure through its Committee stage. Apart from the fact that he took the wrong side on every issue, his performance was masterly.
It was the hon. Gentleman's misfortune that he had to defend the indefensible, and that he had to stick to an illogical compromise which the Minister had worked out with the local authorities and the Ministry of Labour; a compromise that he and the Minister must, in their heart of hearts, know is wrong. The hon. Gentleman listened patiently, argued skilfully—and always gave us exactly nothing. Apart from a very minor Amendment, which we got at a very late stage, the Bill has come back here as it went into the Committee.
I want also to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) on the brilliant way in which he has led our attempts to improve the Bill. We look forward to the time when he will cast off the shadow and assume the substance of Minister of Education. We have been delighted to serve under his leadership in a real battle to make this a much better Bill. And I am sure that I speak for all members of the Committee when I say that we count it a privilege to have had on it as a back bencher the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede), who himself was one of the two architects of the 1944 Act.
It was a pleasant Committee, and we had a pleasant set of deliberations. I commend to the Leader of the House, who seems to have a penchant for the Guillotine, the way in which the Minister of Education let the Opposition do their duty of detailed examination and criticism of a Measure in Committee. We had no Closure, no Guillotine, no cross words.
I support the Bill, but I regret its shortcomings. We could have ended the means test for university students. As it is, we have improved their financial lot and that of those parents who have to make payments towards keeping their children at university, but we have not gone far enough. We could have given a fillip to the prestige of the teacher-training colleges for which even the Parliamentary Secretary's words do not make up.

We had a chance to show the teacher-training colleges, at the beginning of their great adventure of three-year teacher training, that we regard them in exactly the same way as we regard the universities. We have failed to do that.
We could have helped the ratepayer much more. It is true that we have given him help with the extra expenses in Clause 1, but had we had our way we would have given him more help. As my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields pointed out, we could have extended the range of universities considered in Clause 1 beyond Great Britain and Northern Ireland. We wanted to extend the university range to the whole world, as we believe it should be. We could have taken a longer step towards the achievement of secondary education to 16 years of age for all children, if the Opposition had had their way, and had the Government not been so stubborn.
Having said all that, I add that the Bill marks a real, if small advance in British education. Some of us who fought over the years as councillors in local government, and fought, too, on the Floor of the House, for an equitable system of university awards, find it difficult to express our joy in the fact that henceforth all the anomalies and injustices we denounced will go; differences in criteria, differences in the amount of awards, and even the differences between the authorities that grant awards, and—as we discovered on Second Reading—the authorities that still only lend money to students. The difference between the mean authority and the generous authority in regard to university awards has, under the Bill, vanished for all time.

Clause 1 is a milestone and I congratulate the Ministers, both senior and junior and the authorities on it. The authorities, through the years, have devoted much care and pains to a job in which they take great pride; the sifting of potential university candidates. In Clause 1 they have sacrificed something which they have prized. Having sacrificed it to the Minister we believed that that it was only right that the right hon. Gentleman should foot the Bill and not only give the 100 per cent. he has given for the extra cost, but that he should bear 100 per cent. of the entire cost of the Clause.

However, Clause 1 puts heavy responsibilities on the universities and I am sure that they will rise to these responsibilities. When the Bill becomes law the universities alone will decide who goes to them. It will be automatic for both the local authorities and the Minister because the right hon. Gentleman will have to obey his own law. If the universities betray a trust which we are putting in them, if, through carelessness, mutual jealousies or consideration other than educational ones, they fail to carry out the task which the House has entrusted to them, Britain will suffer from that failure in the future.

I am not happy about many of the universities' methods of selection or about the interview as a method of selection. I am not satisfied that we have yet ended the distortion of sixth form work imposed on grammar schools by the requirements of universities as part of their mechanics of selection. I doubt whether universities have built up an adequate clearing house system as effective as that built up by the training colleges. So, when the Bill becomes law, I hope that the heads of universities will get together with grammar school heads and sixth form masters to devise the best methods of securing what must be the goal of us all; that the lad fit for university gets there and the one who is not fit—and we have discussed some of the failures on an earlier Amendment—does not get there, but who, by getting there, keeps out someone who should be there.

I hope, too, that the universities will come out of their ivory towers a little way and collectively approach this problem of selecting worthwhile children for further education in consultation with the colleges of technology, which we regard as primary colleges and by no means as inferior ones. If we are to carry out Clause 1, which fixes certain criteria, its provisions will be within the grasp of thousands of British children who will be entitled to an award at the university—if they can get to one. But there must be a vast expansion of university provision far beyond anything that has yet been planned.

One of the nation's tragedies is that since the war, we have not been prepared to cope with the bulge in the school and university population. It is a tragedy that some boys and girls

who are fit to go to university cannot get there because there are no places for them. One of my hon. Friends mentioned earlier that there were nine times as many wanting to go to university as could do so. I take up that point because it has been said that the position is not as bad as that. Some headmasters pointed out to the Press today that the total number includes the multiple applications for university. Many able boys and girls who will be seeking places from the sixth forms this year will be disappointed because we have lagged behind.

Clause 2, which deals with awards other than universities awards is rather a makeshift provision. It represents a sacrifice to the local authorities who are anxious to preserve their own well-deserved place in the educational partnership. Under it, they will continue to have to make the ratepayer pay for much of the cost of further education, except that provided under Clause 1. Moreover, both Clause 1 and Clause 2 apply for only a short time. We were unable to ensure for the local authorities any financial protection in the years beyond the two years covered by the general grant which is mentioned in a later Clause of the Bill.

The second step forward in the Bill is that which secures for all children, for the first time in British history, at least two years and two-thirds of a year at a secondary school. This is excellent. It will mean much to many children and to many schools. I believe that in the long run it will mean more to the weaker brethren, to the least academic amongst our children. It now means, however, that once this part of the Bill comes into operation, at the top of every secondary school there will be more older children. The Bill will supplement the almost miraculous expansion at the top of secondary modern schools of the number of older children due to the voluntary keeping on by parents of children at school.

From that, it follows that we have to devote much more thought and care than we have done, not merely to the problem of getting adequate staff for the children of the age of 15-plus in our secondary modern schools, but also to the content of the education that we are providing for the 14-yeax-olds and


15-year-olds and, especially for the non-academic child of 15-plus.

I am not a pessimist. No man who had the rich experience of daily contact with young folk, as I have had for a quarter of a century, could lose faith in our young people. I deplore the way in which newspapers seize on the child who goes wrong and features such a child as though it was a typical British youngster. Seeing, as I do, the temptations that face young children—all the resources of a cheap commercial culture flung at them in screaming headlines, lurid book-covers and violent radio and television—I am often amazed that so many of them manage to survive all this without going wrong. The battle for the preservation of worthwhile values is being fought in our schools. It is being fought particularly in the year to which the Bill adds a precious extra term for many children.

I hope that at ministerial level, at professional level among the teachers, at local authority level and at home and at church level, there will be a vast amount of real thinking about the content and purpose of the education of children below the academic stream children in this very mature 14-year-old and 15-year-old group that now confronts us, a 14-year-old and 15-year-old group which is far more mature than any previous generation of the same age.

There follows, too, from this bold step forward of the Minister the need for a campaign to explain to the people just what we are doing when we raise the school-leaving age for some children by a term or a term and a half. We want a positive campaign in which intelligent employers will join and in which unintelligent employers who are deprived for a term of juvenile labour will be taught that we are really doing something good for Britain and, in the long run, even for unintelligent employers. We cannot separate the claims of industry from the claims of education.

I know that the Minister welcomes the closest contact that we can make between the enlightened industrialist and the educationist at local and national level. I admit that the Bill will mean a dislocation of the labour market. There was a similar dislocation—probably a

much bigger one—when the school leaving age was raised, in my father's time, from 11 to 12. We and the Minister believe, however, that the gains that we shall get from the lengthening for certain children of the last year in a secondary school is more than commensurate with any dislocation of labour.

We have to show in the next months, before this part of the Bill comes into practice, that what the Bill does is not to punish some children for having the wrong birthday, but to confer upon hundreds and thousands of children an extra benefit which will help to prepare them for life. But, above all, I believe that we must see that the education in this last year of secondary modern school is education for the less intellectual children, is broad and wide in such a way as to give them the interest about which my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields spoke.

The Bill is a declaration of faith in Britain's future. It is a slightly mild declaration. It is a less wholehearted one than some of us would have made if we could only have persuaded the Minister to understand and accept our very cogent arguments in Committee, but I welcome it and I most sincerely congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on bringing it forward.

I regret that the Minister has not had the statesmanship and the courage to go one stage further and to accept the arguments which he himself has given to us from time to time, because the paradox of the Bill is that the Minister accepts most of the principles which we have tried to write into his own Bill. I sincerely congratulate him on the step forward which he has taken. I am quite sure that the Opposition will bring unqualified support to everything he does to bring the advantages of the Bill and particularly of that part dealing with 15-year-old children, to the notice of the public, and to earn the good will of parents who have to obey this law when it comes into practice in two years' time.

10.27 p.m.

Dr. A. Thompson: My right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) referred to the broad highway of education. I certainly believe that the


Bill does a great deal to broaden the highway and I share the sentiments of my hon. Friends in the general gestures of support which they gave the Bill today. I would make two points about the way in which I think the highway narrows in places and where the difficulty of access still remains. The point I would select is the point referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King) of university entrance and the great responsibility that attaches to the universities in this matter.
On this side of the House, underlying most of our arguments is the belief that boys and girls academically qualified should have access to the universities. We are unhappy about the additional tests imposed at the points of selection. I am personally particularly unhappy about the Oxford and Cambridge methods of selection, largely because they are left to individual colleges. A very eminent Oxford don recently stated that one of the principles of selection was to preserve social balance. I am not very happy about this. As far as I can see, what is meant by preserving social balance is to balance against very clever working-class boys slightly less clever middle-class and upper-class boys. I do not think that he meant it the other way round. The interposing of this criterion of social balance militates slightly against academic standards.
The Minister intervened in Committee to defend the universities on this point of selection and he seemed to place a great deal of faith in their selection methods. I think he places a little too much, not because the universities are bad at it but because a shortage of places in the universities means that the universities have to look for excuses for keeping people out and not for reasons for bringing them in. Wherever demand is greater than supply, the supply must look for reasons for debarring people. Often, these reasons are quite arbitrary.
I do not think that we have a method of selection, based on character and personality and the other non-academic criteria, as elaborate as the Minister seems to believe. His judgment I respect in many ways. In personal cases I have brought to his notice, he has shown great consideration and judgment. But, on this point, he is a little optimistic and perhaps a little misled.
The universities should be in a position to accept students who are academically qualified. In the case of Scotland, which I know better—not because the system is better or worse, but because I am more acquainted with it—the universities should be in a position to accept all those candidates who reach the standards prescribed by the Scottish Universities Entrance Board.
In support of my hon. Friend the Member for Itchen, I say that the distortion imposed on the schools by the universities' method of selection—perhaps not by them as a deliberat policy so much as by the subjects they insist upon—also exists in Scotland. Actually in Scotland it is the Scottish Universities Entrance Board which decides what qualifications are needed. This Board is responsible to nobody—not even the Secretary of State, who refuses to answer questions about it. The Board is a kind of Dr. Beeching—unanswerable to Parliament or the universities or to the schools on this matter. The decisions it makes reach right down into the education system. It affects, and, as my hon. Friend said, sometimes distorts, the pattern of education in the schools.
This is an important question, and I hope that the Minister will look at it again and stop thinking that it does not matter if demand exceeds supply as the universities, by their selection methods, can sort it all out properly. I am not sure that they can. I am sure that if he took his vice-chancellors to lunch they would not, in the privacy of the Athenaeum, where vice-chancellors go for lunch, claim that their selection methods were as good as all that. They would admit that they are often forced to find excuses for excluding people because there are too many applicants.
By 1970 in Scotland, the estimated demand for university places will exceed supply by 9,000. This does not take account of any increase there may be in overseas students. May I say that I would certainly not attempt to exclude overseas students? I applaud the ten dency to bring more and more of these students to this country. Nor does the estimate take account of the increased ratio of women students.
With regard to women students, social change in Scotland is affecting the


balance. Hitherto it has been a marked feature of university life that the girl students are always socially two or three categories above the men. There is a very wide variety of social origins among the men students, including miners' and railwaymen's sons. But the girls seem, with a few honourable exceptions, to come from two or three notches higher up the social scale. As it becomes more acceptable to give daughters the same opportunities at universities as sons—and that acceptance is coming—we might see the demand for places increasing even more than is estimated.
I was very heartened by the speech of the Under-Secretary of State. I thought that it indicated a new liaison between his Department and the universities at this crucial point of the transfer of a boy or girl leaving school to the university. There is no reason why this liaison should not exist. I cannot quite share the view that the Scottish system of education is so superior as my hon. Friend the Member for Flint, East (Mrs. White) claimed. Superiority perhaps exists over a certain range, but if one looks closely at the universities and examines the ratio of staff to students, one finds that in Scottish universities the ratio in some departments is one member of the staff to seventy students. The new University of York is to have a ratio of one staff member to seven students. Clearly, Scotland has a lot of overtaking to do in this respect.
I support my hon. Friend the Member for Itchen in his regret that the prestige and status of the training colleges have not received the attention they deserve. The Educational Institute for Scotland, for instance, made a proposal which was a very good one, that all colleges of education in Scotland should be formed into a degree-granting federation, granting an associateship after three years and a bachelor degree after a four-year course. The fact remains, of course, that in most respects the training colleges are the exact equivalents of the universities. A lecturer in educational psychology at the training colleges must have the same qualifications as a lecturer in educational psychology at the universities.
I agree that the Scottish system with regard to teacher training colleges is different from the English, but I do not propose to be drawn into saying anything

about their respective merits, except to say that the academic requirements for staff are exactly the same for both. Yet we allow the universities to select their students but are less willing to allow the training colleges the right to select the kind of students which they will have.
In some fields the training colleges are in a position to get better academically qualified people because the salaries which they pay are higher than those paid by the universities. A lecturer in psychology at a training college can earn more than a lecturer in psychology at a university. Therefore, the arguments about the inferiority of training colleges seem to me to break down.
As I have said, apart from that, we welcome the constructive and positive parts of the Bill and wish it all success.

10.37 p.m.

Mr. Hannan: Very briefly, I too, wish to say how I welcome some of the provisions of the Bill and dislike some of the others. No doubt the Under-Secretary of State has made a note of those, particularly the one on the reserve course which the Secretary of State for Scotland has in extending the number of leaving dates. I hope that the Secretary of State will not allow himself to be prevailed upon to do anything by way of the provision of employment for young people which will outweigh his wisdom as the Minister responsible for education.
The Bill largely provides by regulation for certain things to happen. Even some of my hon. Friends would not go all the way with me in the matter of the school-leaving age. It has always seemed a mystery to me that whereas, as individuals, they are prepared to do all that they can and to make all the sacrifices that they can to ensure that their own children have the best facilities for as long as they can enjoy them, they acquiesce in and, indeed, provide excuses for and cite the difficulties of administration of the local authorities, and even sympathise with the Secretary of State. They all the time forget that in this matter, as the Minister said in his Second Reading speech, whether we legislate for it or not, young people are to remain longer at school. Let us recognise that fact and make provision for it.
My hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King), with whom I have so often been in so much agreement, said that it is in the schools that the battle for higher standards of living is being fought. Strangely enough, this was supported in a way by the Minister of Transport yesterday when he introduced the Road Traffic Bill. The right hon. Gentleman then said, and he did not say it in his usual facetious manner, that despite the fact that traffic had increased and that the population had increased, the accident rate among children had nevertheless declined. This is due, as the right hon. Gentleman rightly said, to the education in the schools and to the work of the road safety committees, and so forth. Is there not a lesson to be learned from that and, by analogy, something to be learned about delinquency and vandalism? Would it not save the nation countless thousands of pounds if we gave our children a longer education and saved the cost in other ways?
I very much regret Clause 5. The Minister has disentangled Section 43 of the 1946 Act and has included provisions covering further education in Clause 1, of which subsection (2) makes provision for the school bursaries. Some of us have been concerned about the fact that: these provisions were made at a late stage so that we were not able to raise them with the Secretary of State. Clause 5 (1) contains no provision about hardship. The qualification governing school bursaries says that grants are to be made to enable students to take advantage of courses without hardship to themselves; but the word "financial", which appeared in the 1946 Act, has been removed. I do not know why this qualification should be applied to children aged between 15 and 16.
While the Bill contains important provisions about the universities, some of us are equally anxious about the lack of provision and the lack of facilities for those young people who are 15 and 16 years of age, who constitute about 80 per cent. of the school population and who will grow into the adults whose industrial production will be essential to the country's export markets. The lack of day-release facilities in Scotland is shocking. It is true that the Minister is able to point to some recent improvements,

but we are still far short of what is necessary.
My hon. Friend the Member for Itchen was inclined to say that the admission to university of one person in nine in England and Wales was not too bad, but the figures which should be considered are the total number of applications and the total number admitted. Recent returns show that throughout the United Kingdom 190,000 applications were lodged for the session 1961–62 as against 151,000 for the previous year. Of those, 12,600 were submitted in Scotland and only 4,600 accepted. The position was very much worse in England and Wales.
That is a measure of the opportunity. That is the challenge to us. It would be churlish not to admit that the Bill goes some way towards providing better opportunities, the wherewithal, but it does not do anything towards providing the next stage—the facilities and teachers necessary to make use of the most precious raw material the country owns—human brain power.

10.44 p.m.

Mr. Willey: We are bringing to a close a discussion—which, I am sure, everyone will recognise as having been constructive—on some important aspects of education. This is not a debate which will not be continued. We shall be able to resume it on the general grant Orders and on the Regulations to be made under the Bill. Much more important, we recognise that in the Bill we are empowering the Minister fully to implement the recommendations of the Anderson Committee. We warn him that we shall exercise all the pressure we can to encourage him to implement the majority Report.
The Minister has elected to rely upon two school-leaving dates. Again, I give him warning that we shall now exercise all the pressure we can legitimately exercise to encourage him to make an early announcement on the major recomdation of the Crowther Report, and increase the school-leaving age to 16.
Meanwhile, we recognise that we have half a loaf, and we have to remember that these are very hard times for Government Departments which are non-agricultural. We therefore recognise the achievement of the right hon. Gentleman in obtaining this half loaf for us.


The Bill is not unimportant. It will be of considerable help to education—both by reason of its provisions relating to the school-leaving dates and its provisions for awards. We are grateful for what has been done, and we hope that in the next few months, before the end of the Session, we shall have an announcement from the right hon. Gentleman that he will definitely increase the school-leaving age to 16.

10.46 p.m.

Mr. Brooman-White: A good starting point for the Third Reading debate—which has ranged very widely—was given by the right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) when he made a quotation concerning the State of Massachusetts, showing that two hundred years ago America was struggling with problems analogous to those which we are now discussing. I thought that the right hon. Gentleman might have Drought that quotation up to date by referring to the President of the United States' recent message on education to Congress, complaining of the very sort of difficulties that we are faced with—staffing problems, accommodation problems, the availability of places, and so forth. We are too often inclined to think that we alone are battling with these difficulties. In fact, it is a world-wide problem, in respect of which the future position of our nation will depend very much on whether we overcome certain facets of these difficulties faster than our competitors overcome theirs.
The hon. Member for Southampton, Itchen (Dr. King) referred in passing to the rôle played by the hon. Member for Stirling and Falkirk Burghs (Mr. Malcolm MacPherson) in the Committee. I should like to put on record that I hope that no hon. Member will slip into an error that we sometimes make in our Scottish deliberations of confusing quantity with quality. The hon.
Member for Stirling and Falkirk Burghs has very wide knowledge of the subject, and referred directly to the points which mattered. He was absent from the Committee only during the discussion of one Scottish Clause, which concerned leaving dates. I do not think that we suffered greatly because of that, because what we have done in that Clause is in accordance with the concerted views of the Scottish education authorities, directors of education, and bodies representing the Scottish teaching profession and others. I appreciate that many hon. Members would want to push this further, but at this stage we have received no representations asking us to go further than we have in fact gone.
The hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) raised a few points which we touched upon in the course of our discussion, and the hon. Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) was specially concerned with the question of school bursaries. The hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) indicated that we shall have an opportunity for further discussion on this matter, because we are having a revision of the bursary regulations.
In general, the tone of the debate, on both sides, has been very favourable to the Bill. The Opposition always have two choices in their approach to any Measure. They can either say that it is a bad Measure, or that it is a good one, which does not go far enough. They have been very generous in their references to the progress that the Bill has made. This Measure is a big step forward, especially for Scotland, in many ways, and it has been welcomed throughout Scotland. I therefore commend the Bill to the House for Third Reading.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

NATIONALISED INDUSTRIES

Mr. Ernest Popplewell discharged from the Select Committee on Nationalised Industries; Mr. T. Fraser added.—[Mr. Finlay.]

MATERNITY BENEFIT (MRS. A. J. CARNEY)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Finlay.]

10.50 p.m.

Mr. Frank Tomney: I shall not detain the House for long at this late hour. The case I wish to raise concerns a constituent of mine, but, on reading through the papers, I came to the conclusion that it was of general interest to practically all mothers and would-be mothers in the country. The correspondence with the Ministry, my constituent and the insurance officer concerned disclosed, not actual contradictions, but some loose association as between the facts. I came to the conclusion that if this was apparent in a particular case it could be apparent in others and that, in consequence, it would be as well for the case to be ventilated in the House of Commons.
I think it must be accepted that any Government must apply qualifying conditions for the benefits they dispense under the National Health Service. However, within those conditions, there will always be borderline cases which could be the subject of appeal to officers concerned, to tribunals or dealt with in the general legislation. Likewise, the application of electors to seek a hearing through representation in this Chamber is also unquestioned. My constituent felt so keenly about this matter that I decided to bring it to the House of Commons to discuss it even at this late hour.
The subject concerns the pregnancy of my constituent, Mrs. A. Carney, and the termination of that pregnancy, according to the best authorities I can consult, before the 28th week. This, according to the Ministry Regulations governing payment of maternity benefit, disqualified my constituent for reasons which I

shall explain. I have consulted Black's Medical Dictionary on this case. I find that a normal pregnancy consists of 273 days. The shortest pregnancy known to that authority is 240 days and the longest period is 313 days. So there is a discrepancy of forty days, which is a record of the longest term for a known pregnancy. This led me to believe that the experts in dealing with the issue thought that forty days was possible in the period between conception to delivery. The question naturally arises: how can they determine the onset at the time of conception with any degree of accuracy? No doubt there have been countless cases in the courts of maintenance orders concerning women who themselves—this is not unknown—have observed their normal periods up to and including, in some cases, late pregnancy.
This case has not been easy for the insurance officer in making a determination. I can understand his difficulty. My constituent, who is a young wife, was in genuine difficulty because the evidence of her own doctor, Dr. Holmes, the resident hospital obstetrician at St. Charlotte's, and of the midwife who examined her, was contradictory in some respects.
Let us look at some of the evidence. Her own doctor, Dr. Carter, of Shepherd's Bush, certified that she had a miscarriage at thirty weeks on 3rd June, 1961—beyond the twenty-eight weeks which normally would have qualified her for maternity benefit. The resident obstetrician at Queen Charlotte's said in a letter of 18th July to her,
I see that your pregnancy came to an end exactly twenty-eight weeks after the last menstrual period. Your last period was on 19th November, 1960, and delivery occurred on 3rd June, 1961. The foetus had died at approximately eighteen weeks of pregnancy, and at no time were foetal movements felt.
I will come to that later, but the issue of twenty-eight weeks is the issue with which I am mostly concerned.
This was further confirmed by a sister in Queen Charlotte's, Sister Monica Tait, who certified that the date of the expected confinement was 29th August—at the end of the twenty-eight weeks. This evidence contradicts that in the submission by the insurance officer to the


Commissioner. I refer to Regulation 7 (2) of the Maternity Benefit & Miscellaneous Provisions Regulations, 1954, and Section 16 (1,a) of the National Insurance Act, 1948, which reads,
For the purpose of the provisions of this Act relating to maternity benefit—
(a) the expression 'confinement' means labour resulting in the issue of a living child, or labour after twenty-eight weeks of pregnancy resulting in the issue of a child whether alive or dead, and the expression 'confined' shall be construed accordingly;
The submission points out that in the claimant's case the labour did not result in the issue of a living child—and that is not contested.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance (Mrs. Margaret Thatcher): I should like the hon. Member to make it clear which submission he is quoting. Is it the submission of the insurance officer at present before the Commissioner?

Mr. Tomney: Yes. There seems to be a discrepancy. The insurance officer's case as set out to the Commissioner is factual; it has been honestly set out, and I make no complaint about that. The complaint arises when we come to the way in which the evidence was assessed by the insurance officer. He apparently went to considerable pains to disprove my constituent's case. He contacted the doctor concerned, who thereupon changed his evidence and admitted that probably he had made a mistake and that he had not been correct in certifying the period as thirty weeks; it was twenty-eight weeks. This was confirmed by the hospital obstetrician, who said that the pregnancy occurred at twenty-eight weeks.
Sister Tart was also contacted—and I object to this—apparently in one instance by telephone by the insurance officer. The house governor and secretary replied on her behalf in a letter of 9th September to the manager of the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance. The letter said:
I think you will agree that this is precisely the information which Sister Tait gave you on the telephone. Other standard books of reference also confirm the duration of pregnancy as being 280 days from the onset of the last menstrual period.

I think that we can object to information being gathered by telephone in cases of this character. Insurance officers Should be under a duty not to seek evidence other than in the form of written statements which can be verified. My constituent was in a genuine dilemma, in that she thought that she had a claim to benefit. She still thinks that she has.
What can be done, if anything, in a case of this character, because other borderline cases must occur from time to time? This case has been the subject of an appeal to a tribunal. From my knowledge of tribunals, there is no appeal to the Minister from the tribunal's decision. I can understand that. I think that it should be so. The final word in this case is with the tribunal. As no appeal is possible, what can be done? There must be countless women in these circumstances who incur expense by purchasing prams, cots, clothing, nursery furniture, etc., and who, to the best of my knowledge, are precluded from claiming sick benefit in the ordinary way, although there has been a termination of pregnancy other than by normal means.
What redress does a person who incurs all this expense have if the insurance officer or the tribunal decides that her claim according to the Act is not valid? There are other questions to which I could refer which would probably add more weight to this claim, but as they do not concern it directly I shall not refer to them. In this case there were discrepancies in the evidence of my constituent's own doctor, the resident obstetrician at Queen Charlotte's, and the midwife. The evidence of all these persons was subsequently changed and conformed to the case of the insurance officer who investigated. As a consequence, the appeal was unanimously dismissed by the tribunal.
I agree that these are difficult cases, but in such cases it would be better for all concerned—hospital authorities, medical men, and the patient—if a general instruction were issued to insurance officers to make more than a cursory examination of the situation as he knows it and determine exactly what happened. I know from dealing with constituents that one woman will tell another that she had a similar experience but was paid. Statements like this


are very difficult to refute, and people think that they are not being dealt with justly under the Act.
It is absolutely necessary that people administering the Act, including members of the medical profession—because they, too, are engaged in administering the Act—should get the facts right, especially the facts on which an appeal to a tribunal can be based. Facts should be seen to be right from the outset. If as a result of tonight's debate the Ministry will ensure that this happens and will think again about these problems and the various regulations, the object of my raising this matter this evening will have been achieved.

11.5 p.m.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance (Mrs. Margaret Thatcher): May I correct at the outset one or two misapprehensions of the hon. Member for Hammersmith, North (Mr. Tomney)? He said that the tribunal was the last appeal authority. That is not the case. I am very restricted tonight in the way in which I can help him, because the question whether Mrs. Carney is entitled to maternity allowance is at present the subject of an appeal from the tribunal to the Commissioner, who is the final appellate authority.

Mr. Tomney: I will accept that, but it is news to me—and, I think, news generally. I have always understood that the decisions of tribunals set up under Act of Parliament by a Minister were not subject to appeal to the Minister. If that is not the case—and we take the hon. Lady's word tonight—I can see endless difficulties arising in the future. I have been concerned a good deal with trade union negotiations at the Ministry of Labour, and that was my understanding of the matter.

Mrs. Thatcher: The hon. Gentleman has not raised this case in any way with my right hon. Friend or myself before tonight. Had he done so, we would have pointed out that the independent authorities appointed under the National Insurance Act to determine these claims consist, in the first instance, of the insurance officer. From him, there is an appeal to the local tribunal and from the local tribunal there is an appeal to

the National Insurance Commissioner. The whole question of maternity allowance for Mrs. Carney is, therefore,sub judice.
The hon. Gentleman has the advantage of me in that he has seen the submission made by the insurance officer to the Commissioner. That is not accessible to me, because the claim has yet to be heard. I therefore do not know what is contained in the document from which he has quoted. It is, of course, available to the other party to the appeal—Mrs. Carney. He is also not right in saying that Mrs. Carney could not claim sickness benefit while her maternity allowance claim was being decided. She could claim sickness benefit, and the Department has, in fact, invited her to do so.
I think that the best thing I can do, as the claim is sub judice, is merely to recite in narrative form some of the dates and events recorded. In doing so, I can neither confirm nor deny the accuracy of what is Recorded, because of the claim being sub judice, as I could have explained to the hon. Gentleman had he approached us.
The first we heard of the matter was that Mrs. Carney claimed maternity allowance on 25th May, 1961, when she submitted the certificate to which the hon. Gentleman has referred, signed by a midwife, certifying that she might expect to be confined in the week including 29th August. That date, I should add, was later amended to 26th August. Her claim was in order. That is, it was made not more than 14 weeks before the expected week of confinement, and she satisfied the contribution conditions for the award of maternity allowance at the full standard rate of 57s. 6d. a week for the normal period of 18 weeks beginning 11 weeks before the expected week of confinement. Before an award could be made, however, Mrs. Carney notified the local office on 7th June that her child had been stillborn on 3rd June.
The hon. Gentleman has given the definition of confinement, and has pointed out that the issue in this case turns upon whether the pregnancy did, in fact, last for 28 weeks. He is quite right in saying that the insurance officer turned down the claim on the ground that the pregnancy was terminated otherwise than by confinement before the beginning of


the eleventh week, which was then 12th June, but which, on the revised date, would have been 5th June.
Mrs. Carney then appealed to the local tribunal, and the hon. Gentleman has pointed out that a good deal of conflicting evidence came before that tribunal. I must tell him that we are not responsible for the evidence given by doctors; we are responsible for setting up a system by which people are appointed to determine what the facts are. The hearing was on 20th July, in the first place, and Mr. Carney, who represented his wife, produced a letter from her doctor stating that she had had a miscarriage at 30 weeks on 3rd June, and a letter from Queen Charlotte's Maternity and Chelsea Hospitals stating that Mrs. Carney's pregnancy came to an end exactly 28 weeks after the onset of her last menstrual period, which was on 19th November, 1960. That date—19th November, 1960—has never as far as I know, been in dispute and it is one which is crucial in determining when the pregnancy began.
The tribunal adjourned its hearing for further information about relevant dates to be obtained from Mrs. Carney's doctor and the midwife who signed the original certificate. It was at the direction of the tribunal that the insurance officer got in touch with these people. He first consulted the senior medical officer at our regional office and, after he had done so, the Acton local office wrote to Mrs. Carney on 4th August asking her, as is usual in such circumstances, for her written consent to these approaches being made. She replied questioning the necessity for them, suggesting that we already had enough information. Not until 26th August did she give her consent.
The necessary inquiries were then made and Mrs. Carney's doctor replied on 1st September stating that Mrs. Carney's last period began on 19th November, 1960, that she was due to be confined on 26th August—the revised date to which I have already referred—and that he must have miscalculated in saying that her pregnancy terminated after 30 weeks. The house governor and secretary replied on 19th September, on behalf of the midwife at Queen Charlotte's, confirming the information

given by the hospital in its previous letter, namely, that Mrs. Carney's pregnancy came to an end 28 weeks after the onset of her last menstrual period. I will read the actual findings of the tribunal from the record of the tribunal itself. It states:
The tribunal are satisfied that, in general, pregnancy lasts for about 273 days from the end of the last menstrual period. They are also satisfied that it is customary to allow seven days for the duration of such a period. The claimant's last menstrual period prior to 3rd June, 1961 commenced on 19th November, 1960 and her pregnancy must, therefore, be deemed to have commenced on 26th November, 1960.
I must again emphasise that I am only reciting what the tribunal found, not whether it is true or false. That point will now be in dispute before the Commissioner. The document continues:
Accordingly, at the time of her miscarriage she had been pregnant for only 27 weeks and one day, including the day of the miscarriage. In these circumstances the claimant's pregnancy was not terminated by confinement as defined in section 16 (1) (a) of the National Insurance Act, 1946.
Mrs. Carney appealed from that decision of the local tribunal to the Commissioner on 3rd November, and asked for an oral hearing, the grounds of her appeal being that her pregnancy had lasted for 28 weeks and that she had been absent from her work from 3rd June to 18th September.
Mrs. Carney's appeal was submitted to the National Insurance Commissioner on 8th January, 1962, and has not yet been decided. I understand that, on receiving a copy of the insurance officer's statement, Mrs. Carney wrote saying that she intended to submit further observations, but she has not yet done so.
I shall now leave the question of maternity allowance, because that is the stage we have reached and I am not in a position to comment on it, since it is the subject of an appeal. I shall, therefore, turn to the matter of sickness benefit. Because of the grounds of Mrs. Carney's appeal to the Commissioner, contending that she should be entitled to some benefit, the local office wrote to her on 3rd January inviting her to submit medical evidence and to claim sickness benefit. It is clear that she must have been incapable of work for some time after her miscarriage.
Mrs. Carney replied querying whether this might affect her appeal against the disallowance of her claim for maternity allowance. We assured her by letter, a copy of which I have, that it would not affect her claim. So far, she has not responded to this invitation. It is a pity that she has not done so, because we are, naturally, anxious to put before the insurance officer a claim for sickness benefit for the period in question.
It is clear that Mrs. Carney must have been incapable of work for some time after her miscarriage on 3rd June and we know—this is important—that she satisfies the contribution conditions for payment of sickness benefit during that period at the rate of 39s. a week, which is the standard rate for a married woman.

Mr. Tomney: Is there a penalty on the claim for 21 days?

Mrs. Thatcher: We are not sure, because that can only be decided when Mrs. Carney submits a claim. Above all, the insurance officer will need medical evidence of incapacity before he can decide whether, and for how long, sickness benefit is payable.
If she were awarded sickness benefit and the Commissioner decided her claim for maternity allowance in her favour, all that would happen would be that the amount which she had received for sickness benefit would be set off against the amount to which she had become entitled for maternity allowance, which, of course, would be a higher rate—57s. 6d. a week. We shall be grateful

to the hon. Member if he will urge his constituent to submit medical evidence of incapacity for the relevant period, so that we can go ahead and get the claim adjudicated upon.
In reply to the more general point that the hon. Member has raised about the dividing line between the period when sickness benefit may be payable—as a general rule up to the beginning of the eleventh week before the expected week of confinement—and the period after that when maternity allowance is payable, this is in general agreement with the medical definitions of miscarriage and stillbirth, which, of course, are made by reference to the end of the twenty-eighth week of pregnancy. It is also consistent with Section 41 of the Births and Deaths Registration Act, 1953, which defines a stillborn child as
a child which has issued forth from its mother after the twenty-eighth week of pregnancy and which did not at any time after being completely expelled from its mother breathe or show any other signs of life.
Before that stage, it is a miscarriage. Therefore, the general dividing line, which, the hon. Member has admitted, there must be, is in line with general medical definitions and with other Acts.
There is no further assistance which I can give to the hon. Member tonight, but I ask him to assist us by persuading Mrs. Carney to submit the necessary medical evidence of incapacity.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at eighteen minutes past Eleven o'clock.